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4i 


I suppose you can guess why I sent for you, Jane-Ellen,” Crane said 







COME OUT 
OF THE KITCHEN! 

A ROMANCE 


BY 

ALICE DUER MILLER 

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY 

PAUL MEYLAN 



NEW YORK 
THE CENTURY CO. 
1917 


* 



Copyright, 1916, by 
The Century Co. 


Copyright, 1915, by 

International Magazine Company 
(harper’s bazar) 


Published, April, 1916 



'»v 


rl 

L'J 

0*7 


LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

I suppose you can guess why I sent for you, Jane-Ellen,” 
Crane said Frontispiece 

Jane-Ellen sprang forward and snatched the cat from 
Tucker’s knee 37 

‘'You had better be careful, sir” 59 

Cora 77 

Lily 99 

Jane-Ellen 125 

At the sight of Crane, Jane-Ellen stopped with a gesture 
of the utmost horror 143 

“ Think you that we shall ever meet again ? ” . . . . 165 

“Cora,” said Crane, “is that your hat?” 171 

But here something very unfortunate happened . . . 233 

“ And there was no truth in it ? ” 259 

Claudia 269 



% 


COME OUT 
OF THE KITCHEN 1 






♦ 


COME OUT 
OF THE KITCHEN! 


I 


HE window of Randolph Reed’s office was 



A almost completely covered by magnificent 
gold block lettering. This to any one who had 
time and ability to read it — and the former was 
more common in the community than the latter — 
conveyed the information that Reed dealt in every 
kind of real estate, from country palaces to city 
flats. The last item was put in more for the sake 
of symmetry than accuracy, for the small Southern 
town contained nothing approaching an apartment 


house. 


From behind this pattern of gold, Reed peered 
eagerly one autumn afternoon, chewing the end of 
a frayed cigar, and listening for the sound of a 
motor. He was a stout young man, of an amiable 
though unreadable countenance, but like many peo- 


3 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


pie of a heavy build, he was capable of extreme 
quickness of movement. This was never more 
clearly shown than when, about four o’clock, the 
wished for sound actually reached his ears. A 
motor was approaching. 

With a bound Reed left the window, and, seated 
at his desk, presented in the twinkling of an eye 
the appearance of a young American business man, 
calm and efficient, on an afternoon of unusual 
business pressure. He laid papers in piles, put 
them in clips and took them out, snapped rubber 
bands about them with frenzied haste, and finally 
seizing a pen, he began to indite those well-known 
and thrilling words : “Dear Sir: Yours of the 
15th instant received and contents — ” when the 
motor drew up before his door. 

It was an English car; all green and nickel; it 
moved like an expert skater on perfect ice. As 
it stopped, the chauffeur dropped from his place 
beside the driver. The driver himself, removing 
his glasses, sprang from the car and up the office 
steps, slapping the pockets of his coat as he did 
so in a search which soon appeared to be for ciga- 
rettes and matches. 


4 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


“ Sorry to be late,” he said. 

Reed, who had looked up as one who did not at 
once remember, in his vast preoccupation, either 
his visitor or his business, now seemed to recall 
everything. He waved the newcomer to a chair, 
with a splendid gesture. 

“ Doubtless the roads,” he began. 

“ Roads ! ” said the other. “ Mud-holes. No, 
we left Washington later than I intended. Well, 
have you got the house for me ? ” 

Reed offered his client a cigar. 

“ No, thank you, prefer my cigarette if you 
don’t mind.” 

Reed did not mind in the least. The real estate 
business in Vestalia was never brilliant, and several 
weeks’ profits might easily have been expended in 
one friendly smoke. 

His client was a man under thirty, of a type that 
used to be considered typically American — that 
is to say, Anglo-Saxon, modified by a century or 
so of New England climate and conscience. His 
ancestors had been sailors, perhaps, and years of 
exposure had tanned their skins and left their 
eyes as blue as ever. His movements had the gen- 
5 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

tleness characteristic of men who are much with 
horses, and though he was active and rather 
lightly built, he never was sudden or jerky in any 
gesture. Something of this same quietness might 
be detected in his mental attitude. People some- 
times thought him hesitating or undecided on ques- 
tions about which his mind was irrevocably made 
up. He took a certain friendly interest in life as 
a whole, and would listen with such patience to an 
expression of opinion that the expresser of it was 
often surprised to find the opinion had had no 
weight with him, whatsoever. 

He stood now, listening with the politest atten- 
tion to Reed’s somewhat flowery description of the 
charms of the Revelly house — charms which 
Crane himself had examined in the minutest detail. 

“ Never before,” exclaimed the real estate 
agent, in a magnificent peroration, “ never before 
has the splendid mansion been rented — ” 

“ Ah,” said Crane with a smile, “ I believe you 
there.” 

“ Never been offered for rent,” corrected the 
real estate agent, with a cough. “ Its delightful 
colonial flavor — ” 


6 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

“ Its confounded dilapidation,” said the pros- 
pective tenant. 

“ Its boxwood garden, its splendid lawns, its 
stables, accommodating twenty-five horses — ” 

“ Yes, if they don’t lean up against the sides.” 

Reed frowned. 

“ If,” he remarked with a touch of pride, “ you 
do not want the house — ” 

The young man of the motor car laughed good- 
temperedly. 

“ I thought we had settled all that last week,” 
he said. “ I do want the house; I do appreciate 
its beauties; I do not consider it in good repair, 
and I continue to think that the price for six weeks 
is very high. Have the owners come down? ” 

Reed frowned again. 

“ I thought I made it clear, on my part,” he 
answered, “that Mr. and Mrs. Revelly are be- 
yond the reach of communication. They are on 
their way to Madeira. Before they left they set 
the price on their house, and I can only follow 
their instructions. Their children — there are 
four children — ” 

“ Good heavens, I don’t have to rent them with 

7 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


the house, do I ? ” exclaimed the other frivolously. 

The real estate agent colored, probably from 
annoyance. 

“ No, Mr. Crane,” he answered proudly, “ you 
do not, as far as I know, have to do anything you 
do not wish to do. What I was about to say was 
that the children have no authority to alter the 
price determined by their parents. To my mind, 
however, it is not a question of absolute value. 
There is no doubt that you can find newer and 
more conveniently appointed houses in the hunt- 
ing district — certainly cheaper ones, if price be 
such an object. But the Revelly family — one of 
the most aristocratic families south of Mason and 
Dixon’s, sir — would not be induced to consider 
renting under the sum originally named.” 

“ It ’s pretty steep,” said the young man, but his 
mild tone already betrayed him. “ And how 
about servants ? ” 

“ Ah,” said Reed, looking particularly mask- 
like, “ servants ! That has been the great diffi- 
culty. To guarantee domestic service that will 
satisfy your difficult Northern standards — ” 

“ I am fussy about only two things,” said Crane, 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ cooking and boots. Must have my boots prop- 
erly done.” 

‘‘If you could have brought your own valet — ” 

“ But I told you he has typhoid fever. Now, 
see here, Mr. Reed, there really is n’t any use 
wasting my time and yours. If you have not been 
able to get me a staff of servants with the house, I 
would n’t dream of taking it. I thought we had 
made that clear.” 

Reed waved his impatient client again to his 
chair. 

“ There are at this moment four well-recom- 
mended servants yonder in the back office, waiting 
to be interviewed.” 

“By me?” exclaimed Crane, looking slightly 
alarmed. 

Reed bowed. 

“ I wish first, however,” he went on, “ to say a 
word or two about them. I obtained them with 
the greatest difficulty, from the Crosslett-Billing- 
tons, of whom you have doubtless often heard.” 

“ Never In my life,” said Crane. 

Reed raised his eyebrows. 

“ He is one of our most distinguished citizens. 

9 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


His collection of tapestry, his villa at Capri — 
Ah, well, but that is immaterial! The family is 
now abroad, and has in consequence consented, as a 
personal favor to me, to allow you to take over 
four of their servants for the six weeks you will 
be here, but not a minute longer.” 

Crane leaned back and blew smoke in the air. 

“ Are they any good? ” he asked. 

“ You must judge for yourself.” 

“ No, you must tell me.” 

“ The butler is a competent person; the skill of 
the cook is a proverb — but we had better have 
them come in and speak to you themselves.” 

“ No, by Jove ! ” cried Crane, springing to his 
feet. “ I don’t think I could stand that.” And 
he incontinently rushed from the office to the 
motor, where three mummy-like figures on the 
back seat had remained immovable during his ab- 
sence. 

Of these, two were female and one male. To 
the elder of the women. Crane applied, hat in 
hand. 

“ Won’t you give me the benefit of your advice, 
Mrs. Falkener,” he said. ” The agent has some 


lO 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


servants for me. The wages and everything like 
that have all been arranged, but would you mind 
just looking them over for me and telling me what 
you think about them? ” 

To invite Mrs. Falkener to give her advice on 
a detail of household management was like inviting 
a duck to the pond. She stepped with a queen-like 
dignity from the car. She was a commanding 
woman who swam through life, borne up by her 
belief in her own infallibility. To be just, she was 
very nearly infallible in matters of comfort and do- 
mestic arrangement, and it was now many years 
since she had given attention to anything else in 
the world. She was a thorough, able and awe-in- 
spiring woman of fifty-three. 

Now she moved into Reed’s office, witjh motor-, 
veils and dusters floating about her, like a solid 
wingless victory, and sat down in Randolph Reed’s 
own chair. (It was part of her philosophy never 
to interview a social inferior until she herself was 
seated.) With a slight gesture of her gloved 
hand, she indicated that the servants might be ad- 
mitted to her presence. 

The door to the back office opened and the four 


II 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


candidates entered. The first was the butler, a 
man slightly younger in years than most of those 
careworn functionaries. He came forward with a 
quick, rapid step, turning his feet out and walking 
on his toes. Only Mrs. Falkener recognized that 
it was the walk of a perfect butler. She would 
have engaged him on the spot, but when she noted 
that his hair was parted from forehead back to the 
line of his collar and brushed slightly forward in 
front of his ears, she experienced a feeling of envy 
and for the first time thought with dissatisfaction 
of the paragon she had left in charge of her own 
pantry at home. 

She did indeed ask him a question or two, just 
to assure herself of his English intonation, which. 
It must be owned, a residence in the South had 
slightly influenced. And then with a start she 
passed on to the next figure — the cook. 

On her the eyes of her future employer had al- 
ready been fixed since the door first opened, and 
it would be hardly possible to exaggerate the ef- 
fect produced by her appearance. She might have 
stepped from a Mid-Victorian Keepsake, or Book 
of Beauty. She should have worn eternally a crln- 


12 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


oline and a wreath of flowers; her soft gray-blue 
eyes, h^r little bowed mouth, her slim throat, 
should have been the subject of a perpetual steel 
engraving. She was small, and light of bone, and 
her hands, crossed upon her check apron ( for she 
was in her working dress), were so little and soft 
that they seemed hardly capable of lifting a pot or 
kettle. 

Mrs. Falkener expressed the general sentiment 
exactly when she gasped : 

“ And you are the cook? ” 

The cook, whose eyes had been decorously fixed 
upon the floor, now raised them, and sweeping one 
rapid glance across both her employer and the 
speaker, whispered discreetly: 

“ Yes, ma’am.” 

“ What is your name? ” 

And at this question a curious thing happened. 
The butler and Reed answered simultaneously. 
Only, the butler said “ Jane,” and Reed, with equal 
conviction, said “ Ellen.” 

Ignoring this seeming contradiction, the cook 
fixed her dove-like glance on Mrs. Falkener and 
answered: 


13 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ My name Is Jane-Ellen, ma’am.” 

It was impossible for even as conscientious a 
housekeeper as Mrs. Falkener to be really severe 
with so gentle a creature, but she contrived to say, 
with a certain sternness : 

“ I should like to see your references, Jane- 
Ellen.” 

“ Oh, I ’m sure that will be all right, Mrs. Falk- 
ener,” said Crane hastily. He had never removed 
his eyes from the face of his future cook. 

But Jane-Ellen, with soft gestures of those 
ridiculous hands, was already unfolding a paper, 
and now handed it to Mrs. Falkener. 

That lady took it and held it off at arm’s length 
while she read it. 

“ And who,” she asked, turning to Reed, “ is 
this Claudia Revelly? Mrs. Revelly, I suppose? ” 

“ Why, no,” answered Reed. “ No, as I told 
you, Mrs. Revelly is in Madeira with her husband. 
This Is one of the Miss Revellys.” 

“Humph,” replied Mrs. Falkener. “It is a 
flattering reference, but In my time the word ‘ rec- 
ommend ’ was spelled with only one ‘ c.’ ” 

The cook colored slightly and flashed a glance 

14 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


that might have been interpreted as reproachful 
at Reed, who said hastily: 

“ Ah, yes, quite so. You know — the fact is — 
our Southern aristocracy — the Revellys are 
among our very — However, there can be no 
question whatever about Jane-Ellen’s ability. You 
will, I can assure you from personal experience, be 
satisfied with her cooking. Mrs. Crosslett-Bill- 
ington — ” 

“ Humph! ” said Mrs. Falkener again, as one 
who does not mean to commit herself. “ We shall 
see. Let the housemaid come a little forward.” 

At this a young woman advanced; she bore a 
certain resemblance of feature to the butler, but 
entirely lacked his competent alertness. 

“ This young woman looks to me sullen,” Mrs. 
Falkener observed to Crane, hardly modulating 
her clear, dry tone of voice. 

Crane betrayed his embarrassment. He wished 
now that he had not invited his elderly friend’s 
cooperation. 

“ Oh,” he said, “ I ’m sure it will be all right. 
It must be a trifle annoying to be looked over like 
this.” 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


“ The best way to settle this sort of thing is at 
the start,” replied Mrs. Falkener, and turning to 
the housemaid, she asked her her name. 

“ Lily,” replied the young woman, in a deep 
voice of annoyance. 

“ Lily,” said Mrs. Falkener, as if this were a 
most unsuitable name for a housemaid, and she 
looked up at Crane to confirm her opinion, but he 
was again looking at the cook and did not notice 
her. 

“ Well, Lily,” continued the elder lady, as if she 
made a distinct concession in making use of such 
a name at all in addressing a servant, “ do you or 
do you not want to take this place? There is, 
I suppose, nothing to compel you to take it if 
you do not want. But now is the time to say 

SO. 

Lily, with a manner that did seem a little un- 
gracious, replied that she did want it, and added, 
on receiving a quick glance from the butler. Smith- 
field, ” Madame.” 

“ Well, then,” said Mrs. Falkener, becom- 
ing more condescending, “ we shall expect a more 
pleasant demeanor from you, a spirit of coopera- 
i6 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


tion. Nothing is more trying for yourself or your 
fellow servants — ” 

Reed moved forward and whispered in Mrs. 
Falkener’s ear: 

“ It will straighten out of itself, my dear 
madame — nothing but a little embarrassment — 
a grande dame like yourself, you understand me, 
a tremendous impression on a young woman of 
this sort — ” 

Mrs. Falkener interrupted him. 

“ What is the name of the boy in the corner ? ” 
she asked. 

At this, a round-faced lad of perhaps eighteen 
sprang forward. The most striking items of his 
costume were a red neckerchief and a green baize 
apron and leggings, giving to his appearance a 
slight flavor of a horse-boy in an illustration to 
Dickens. 

“ I, ma’am,” he said, with a strong cockney ac- 
cent, “ am the Useful Boy, as they say in the 
States.” 

“ He ’s very good at doing boots,” said Reed. 

“ Boots,” cried the boy, and kissing his hand 
he waved it in the air with a gesture we have been 

17 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

accustomed to think of as continental rather than 
British, “ a boot, particularly a riding-boot, is to 
me — ” 

“ What is your name? ” Mrs. Falkener asked, 
and this time the severity of her manner was un- 
mistakable. 

It did not, however, dampen the enthusiasm of 
the last candidate. 

“ My name, ma’am,” he replied, “ is B-r-i-n- 
d-l-e-b-u-r-y.” 

“ Brindlebury? ” 

“ Pronounced, ‘ Brinber ’ — the old Sussex 
name with which, ma’am, I have no doubt you, as 
a student of history — ” 

Mrs. Falkener turned to Crane. 

“ I think you will have trouble with that boy,” 
she said. “ He is inclined to be impertinent.” 

Crane looked at the boy over her head, and 
the boy, out of a pair of twinkling gray eyes, 
looked back. They both managed to look away 
again before a smile had been actually exchanged, 
but Crane found himself making use for the third 
time of his favorite formula : 

“ Oh, I think I ’ll find him all right.” 

i8 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


Mrs. Falkener, remembering the pitiable weak- 
ness of men, again waved her hand. 

“ They may go now,” she said to Reed, who 
hastily shepherded the four back again into the 
back office. When they were alone, she turned 
to Crane and said with the utmost conviction : 

“ My dear Burton, none of those servants will 
do — except the butler, who appears to be a 
thoroughly competent person. But those young 
women — they may have been anything. Did you 
not observe that their nails had been manicured? ” 

Crane stammered slightly, for the fact had not 
escaped him, in connection, at least, with one of 
the young women. 

“ Don’t — don’t cooks ever manicure their 
nails ? ” he said. “ It seems rather a good idea to 
me.” 

Reed, who was once more approaching, caught 
these last words. 

“ Ah,” he said, “ you were speaking of the mani- 
curing of servants’ nails — ” 

Mrs. Falkener gave him a severe look. 

“ I was advising Mr. Crane not to engage any 
one but the butler.” 


19 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ Indeed, how very interesting,” said Reed. 
“ Your judgment in the matter is very valuable, 
madame, I know, but perhaps you do not suf- 
ficiently emphasize the difficulties of getting any 
servants at all in this part of the country. In fact, 
I could not undertake, if these are not en- 
gaged — ” 

“Well, I could,” said the lady. “I could 
telegraph to New York to my own intelligence 
office and have three really competent people here 
by to-morrow evening.” 

For a moment Reed looked profoundly dis- 
tressed, and then he went on : 

“ Exactly, I have no doubt, madame. But 
what I was about to say was that I could not un- 
dertake to rent the Revelly house to a staff of un- 
known Northern servants. You see, these two 
young women have been practically brought up in 
the household of Mrs. Crosslett-Billington — an 
old family friend of the Revellys — ^and they 
know they would take care of things in the way 
they are accustomed to — ” 

“ Of course, of course, very natural,” said 
Crane. “ I quite agree. I ’m willing to give 


20 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


these people a chance. Of course, Mrs. Falk- 
ener, I don’t know as much about these things a§ 
you do, but it ’s only for a few weeks, and as for 
their nails — ” 

“ Oh, I can explain that,” cried Reed; “ in 
fact, I should have done so at the start. It ’s an 
idiosyncrasy of Mr. Billington’s. He insists that 
all the servants in the house should be manicured, 
particularly those who wait on table, or have any- 
thing to do with touching the food.” 

Mrs. Falkener compressed her lips till they were 
nothing but a seam in her face. 

“Humph!” she said again, and without an- 
other word she turned and swept out of the of- 
fice. 

Left alone, the two men stood silent, without 
even looking at each other, and finally it was Crane 
who observed mildly: 

“ Well, you know, they are a little queer in some 
ways — ” 

“ Take my word for it,” said Reed, earnestly, 
“ you will make no mistake in engaging them all 
— except that boy, but you can manage him, I 
have no doubt. As for the cook, you will be sur- 


21 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


prised. Her cooking is famous in three counties, 
I assure you.” 

An instant later, the lease was duly signed. 

When the motor was safely on its way back to 
Washington, Mrs. Falkener gave her companions 
on the back seat the benefit of her own impres- 
sion. One was her daughter, a muscular, dark- 
eyed girl, who imagined that she had thoroughly 
emancipated herself from her mother’s dominance 
because she had established a different field of in- 
terest. She loved out-of-door sport of all kinds, 
particularly hunting, and was as keen and compe- 
tent about them as her mother was about house- 
hold management. The two respected each 
other’s abilities, and managed to lead an affec- 
tionate life in common. 

The man on the back seat was Solon Tucker — 
Crane’s lawyer, by inheritance rather than by 
choice. He was a thin, erect man, with a narrow 
head and that expression of mouth at once hard 
and subtle that the Law writes on so many men’s 
faces. His mind was excellently clear, his man- 
ner reserved, and his invariable presupposition 
that all human beings except himself were likely 


22 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


to make fools of themselves. He had, however, 
Immense respect for Mrs. Falkener’s opinions on 
any subject except law — on which he respected 
nobody’s opinions but his own, least of all those 
of judges; and he believed that nothing would so 
effectively lighten his own responsibilities in re- 
gard to Crane as to marry him to Mrs. Falkener’s 
daughter, an idea in which Mrs. Falkener cor- 
dially agreed. 

“ You must make a point of staying with him, 
Solon,” she was now murmuring into that gentle- 
man’s rather large ear, “ if, as I fear, he actually 
takes this house. You have never seen such an ex- 
traordinary group of servants — except the but- 
ler. Do you suppose it could be a plot, a black- 
mailing scheme of some sort? The cook — 
Well, my dear Solon, a pocket Venus, a stage In- 
genue, with manicured nails ! He was determined 
to engage her from the first. It seems very un- 
safe to me. A bachelor of Burton’s means. You 
must stay by him, Solon. In fact,” she added, “ I 
think we had better both stay by him. Poor 
boy, he has no idea of taking care of himself.” 

“ He can be very obstinate,” said his lawyer. 

23 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


“ But I fanq)- you exaggerate the dangers. You 
are unaccustomed to any but the very highest type 
of English servant. They are probably nothing 
worse than incompetent.” 

“ Wait till you see the cookl ” answered Mrs. 
Falkener portentously. 

Tucker looked away over the darkening land- 
scape. 

“ Dear me,” he thought to himself. “ What a 
mountain she makes of a mole-hill I How every 
one exaggerates — except trained minds ! ” 

In Tucker’s opinion all trained minds were 
legal. 


24 


II 


O N the following Monday, late in the after- 
noon, the old Revelly house was awaiting 
its new master. Already hunters, ponies, two- 
wheeled carts, an extra motor, to say nothing 
of grooms, stable-boys, and a tremendous head 
coachman, had arrived and were making the stable 
yards resound as they had not done for seventy 
years. But they had nothing to do with the house- 
hold staff. They were all to be boarded by the 
coachman’s wife who was installed in the gar- 
dener’s cottage. 

The house, with Its tall pillared portico and flat 
roofed wings, lost its shabby air as the afternoon 
light grew dimmer, and by six o’clock, when 
Crane’s motor drew up before the door, it pre- 
sented nothing but a dignified and spacious mass 
to his admiring eyes. 

No one but Tucker was with him. He had 
had some difficulty in avoiding the pressing desire 

25 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 

of the two Falkener ladies to be with him at the 
start and help him, as they put it, “ get everything 
in order.” He had displayed, however, a firm- 
ness that they had not expected. He had been 
more embarrassed than he cared to remember by 
Mrs. Falkener’s assistance in the real estate office, 
and he decided to begin his new housekeeping 
without her advice. He would, indeed, have dis- 
pensed with the companionship even of Tucker 
for a day or two, but that would have been impos- 
sible without a direct refusal, and Burton was un- 
willing to hurt the feelings of so true and loyal a 
friend, not only of his own but of his father before 
him. 

The dignified butler and the irrepressible boy, 
Brindlebury, ran down the steps to meet them, 
and certainly they had no reason to complain of 
their treatment; bags were carried up and un- 
strapped, baths drawn, clothes laid out with the 
most praiseworthy promptness. 

Tucker had advocated a preliminary tour of in- 
spection. 

“ It is most Important,” he murmured to Crane, 
“ to give these people the idea from the start that 
26 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


you cannot be deceived or Imposed upon.” But 
Crane refused even to consider such questions un- 
til he had had a bath and dinner. 

The plan of the old house was very simple. 
On the right of the front door was the drawing- 
room, on the left a small library and a room which 
had evidently been used as an office. The stairs 
went up In the center, shallow and broad, winding 
about a square well. The dining-room ran across 
the back of the house. 

When Tucker came down dressed for dinner, 
he found Crane was ahead of him. He was 
standing In the drawing-room bending so Intently 
over something on a table that Tucker, who was 
not entirely without curiosity, came and bent over 
It, too, and even the butler, who had come to an- 
nounce dinner, craned his neck In that direction. 

It was a miniature, set In an old-fashioned frame 
of gold and pearls. It represented a young 
woman In a mauve tulle ball dress, full In the skirt 
and cut off the shoulders, as was the fashion In the 
days before the war. She wore a wreath of 
fuchsias, one of which trailing down just touched 
her bare shoulder. 


27 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ Well,” said Tucker contemptuously, ” you 
don’t consider that a work of art, do you ? ” 

Burton remained as one entranced. 

“ It reminds me of some one I know,” he an- 
swered. 

“ It is quite obviously a fancy picture,” replied 
Tucker, who was something of a connoisseur, 
“ Look at those upturned eyes, and that hand. 
Did you ever see a live woman with such a tiny 
hand?” 

” Yes, once,” said Crane, but his guest did not 
notice him. 

“ The sentimentality of the art of that period,” 
Tucker continued, “ which is so plainly manifested 
in the poetry — ” 

“ Beg pardon, sir,” said Smithfield, “ the soup is 
served.” 

Crane reluctantly tore himself from the picture 
and sat down at table, and such is the materialism 
of our day that he was evidently immediately com- 
pensated. 

” By Jove,” he said, “ what a capital pu- 
ree ! ” 

Even Tucker, who, under Mrs. Falkener’s tul- 
28 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


tion, had intended to find the food uneatable, was 
obliged to confess its merits, 

“ I say,” said Crane to Smithfield, “ tell the 
cook, will you, that I never tasted such a soup — 
not out of Paris, or even in it.” 

“ She probably never heard of Paris,” put in 
Tucker. 

Smithfield bowed. 

“ I will explain your meaning to her, sir,” 
he said. 

Dinner continued on the same high plane, end- 
ing with two perfect cups of coffee, which called 
forth such eulogies from Crane that Tucker said 
finally, as they left the dining-room : 

“ Upon my word, Burt, I never knew you cared 
so much about eating.” 

“ I love art. Tuck,” said the other, slapping his 
friend on the back. “ I appreciate perfection. I 
worship genius.” 

Tucker began to feel sincerely distressed. In- 
deed he lay awake for hours, worrying. He had 
counted, from Mrs. Falkener’s description, on 
finding the servants so incompetent that the house 
would be impossible. He had hoped that one 
29 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


dinner would have been enough to send Crane 
to the telegraph office of his own accord, sum- 
moning servants from the North. He had al- 
most promised Mrs. Falkener that when she and 
her daughter arrived the next afternoon, they 
would find a new staff expected, if not actually 
installed. Instead he would have to greet her 
with the news that the pocket Venus with the 
polished nails had turned out to be a cordon bleu. 
That is, if she were really doing the cooking. 
Perhaps — this idea occurred to Tucker shortly 
before dawn — perhaps she was just pretending to 
cook; perhaps she had hired some excellent old 
black Mammy to do the real work. That should 
be easily discoverable. 

He determined to learn the truth; and on this 
resolution fell asleep. 

The consequence was that he came down to 
breakfast rather cross, and would n’t even answer 
Crane, who was In the most genial temper, when 
he commented favorably on the omelette. In 
fact, he let it appear that this constant preoccu- 
pation with material details was distasteful to 
him. 


30 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


Crane, as he rose from the table, turned to 
Smithfield : 

“ Will you tell the cook I ’d like to see her,” 
he said. “ I ’m expecting some ladies to stay, this 
afternoon, and I want to make things comfortable 
for them. Be off. Tuck, there ’s a good fellow, 
if this sort of thing bores you.” 

But wild horses would not at that moment have 
dragged Tucker away, and he observed tha.t he 
supposed there was no objection to his finishing 
his breakfast where he was. 

Smithfield coughed. 

“ I ’m sure I beg your pardon, sir,” he said, 
“ but if you could tell me what it is you want, I 
would tell the cook. She has a peculiar nature, 
Jane-Ellen has, sir; has had from a child; and, 
if you would forgive the liberty, I believe it 
would be best for you not to interview her your- 
self.” 

Tucker looked up quickly. 

“ Why, what do you mean? ” asked Crane. 

“ She is very timid, sir, very easily affected by 
criticism — ” 

“ Good heavens, I don’t want to criticize her! ” 

31 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


cried Crane. “ I only want to tell her how highly 
I think of her.” 

“ In my opinion, Burton,” Tucker began, when 
an incident occurred that entirely changed the situ- 
ation. 

A very large elderly gray cat walked into the 
room, with the step of one who has always been 
welcome, and approaching Tucker’s chair as if it 
were a familiar place, he jumped suddenly upon 
his knee and began to purr In his face. 

Tucker, under the most favorable circum- 
stances, was not at his best In the early morning. 
Later in the day he might have borne such an oc- 
currence with more calm, but before ten o’clock 
he was like a man without armor against such 
attacks. He sprang to his feet with an ex- 
clamation, and drove the cat ahead of him 
from the room, returning alone an instant 
later. 

“ It Is outrageous,” he said, when he returned, 
“ that our lives are to be rendered miserable by 
that filthy beast.” 

“ Sit down. Tuck,” said Burton, who was talk- 
ing about wines with the butler. “ My life is not 

32 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


rendered in the least miserable. The champagne, 
Smithfield, ought to go on the ice — ” 

Tucker, however, could not distract his mind so 
quickly from the thought of the outrage to which 
he had just been subjected. 

“ I must really ask you, Burton,” he said, “ be- 
fore you go on with your orders, to insist that that 
animal be drowned, or at least sent out of the 
house — ” 

“ Oh, I beg, sir, that you won’t do that,” broke 
In Smithfield. ‘‘ The cat belongs to the cook, and 
I really could not say, sir, what she might do, if 
the cat were put out of the house.” 

“ We seem to hear a vast amount about what 
this cook likes and does n’t like,” said Tucker, 
dribbling a little more hot milk into his half cup 
of coffee. “ The house, I believe, is not run en- 
tirely for her convenience.” 

It is possible that Crane had already been ren- 
dered slightly Inimical to his friend’s point of 
view, but he was saved the trouble of answering 
him, for at this moment the cook herself entered 
the room. In what no one present doubted for an 
instant was a towering rage. She was wearing a 
33 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


sky blue gingham dress, her eyes were shining 
frightfully, and her cheeks were very pink. 

At the sight of her, all conversation died away. 

The butler approaching her, attempted to draw 
her aside, murmuring something to which she paid 
no attention. 

“ No,” she said aloud, pulling her arm away 
from his restraining hand, “ I will not go away 
and leave it to you. I will not stay in any house 
where dumb animals are ill-treated, least of all, 
my own dear cat.” 

It is, as most of us know to our cost, easier to 
be pompous than dignified when one feels oneself 
in the wrong. 

“ Pooh,” said Tucker, “ your cat was not ill- 
treated. She had no business in the dining- 
room.” 

“ He was kicked,” said the cook. 

“ Come, my girl,” returned Tucker, “ this is 
not the way to speak to your employer.” 

And at this, with one of those complete changes 
of manner so disconcerting in the weaker sex, the 
cook turned to Crane, and said, with the most 
melting gentleness: 


34 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“I’m sure it was not you, sir. I am sure 
you would not do such a thing. You will 
excuse me if I was disrespectful, but perhaps 
you know, if you have ever loveid an animal, 
how you feel to see it brutally kicked down- 
stairs.” 

“ Preposterous,” said Tucker, carefully indicat- 
ing that he was addressing Crane alone. “ This 
is all preposterous. Tell the woman to keep her 
cat where it belongs, and we ’ll have no more trou- 
ble.” 

“ It has n’t troubled me. Tuck,” answered 
Crane cheerfully. “ But I am curious to know 
whether or not you did kick him.” 

“ The question seems to be, do you allow your 
servants to be insolent or not?” 

Crane turned to the cook. 

“Mr. Tucker seems unwilling to commit him- 
self on the subject of the kick,” he observed. 
“ Have you any reason for supposing your cat was 
kicked? ” 

“ Yes,” said Jane-Ellen. “ The noise, the 
scuffle, the bad language, and the way Willoughby 
ran into the kitchen with his tail as big as a fox’s. 
35 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


He is not a cat to make a fuss about nothing, I 
can tell you.” 

“ I beg your pardon,” said Crane, who was now 
evidently enjoying himself, “ but what did you 
say the cat’s name is? ” 

“ Willoughby.” 

Burton threw himself back In his chair. 

“ Willoughby I ” he exclaimed, “ how perfectly 
delightful. Now, you must own. Tuck, preju- 
diced as you are, that that’s the best cat name 
you ever heard in your life.” 

But Tucker would not or could not respond to 
this overture, and so Crane looked back at Jane- 
Ellen, who looked at him and said: 

“ Oh, do you like that name ? I ’m so glad, 
sir.” And at this they smiled at each other. 

“ Don’t you think you had better go back to 
the kitchen, Jane-Ellen?” said the butler sternly. 

In the meantime. Tucker had lighted a cigar 
and had slightly recovered his equanimity. 

“ As a matter of fact,” he now said, in a deep, 
growling voice, “ I did not kick the creature at all 
— though, if I had, I should have considered my- 
self fully justified. I merely assisted its prog- 

36 


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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


ress down the kitchen stairs with a sort of push 
with my foot.” 

“ It was a kick to Willoughby,” said the cook, 
in spite of a quick effort on Smithfield’s part to 
keep her quiet. 

“ O Tuck! ” cried Crane, “ it takes a lawyer, 
does n’t it, to distinguish between a kick and an 
assisting push with the foot. Well, Jane-Ellen,” 
he went on, turning to her, “ I think it ’s not too 
much to ask that Willoughby be kept in the kitchen 
hereafter.” 

“ I ’m sure he has no wish to go where he ’s 
not wanted,” she replied proudly, and at this in- 
stant Willoughby entered exactly as before. All 
four watched him in a sort of hypnotic inactivity. 
As before, he walked with a slow, firm step to the 
chair in which Tucker sat, and, as before, jumped 
upon his knee. But this time Tucker did not 
move. He only looked at Willoughby and 
sneered. 

Jane-Ellen, with the gesture of a mother res- 
cuing an innocent babe from massacre, sprang for- 
ward and snatched the cat up in her arms. Then 
she turned on her heel and left the room. As she 


39 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


did so, the face of Willoughby over her shoulder 
distinctly grinned at the discomfited Tucker. 

Not unnaturally, Tucker took what he could 
from the situation. 

“ If I were you, Burt,” he said, “ I should get 
rid of that young woman. She is not a suitable 
cook for a bachelor’s establishment. She ’s too 
pretty and she knows it.” 

“Well, she wouldn’t have sense enough to 
cook so well, if she did n’t know it.” 

“ It seems to me she trades on her looks 
when she comes up here and makes a scene like 
this.” 

“ Beg pardon, sir,” said Smithfield, with a 
slightly heightened color, “ Jane-Ellen is a very 
good, respectable girl.” 

“ Certainly, she is,” said Crane, rising. 
“ Nothing could be more obvious. Just run 
down, Smithfield, and ask her to send up a menu 
for to-night’s dinner.” Then, as the man left 
the room, he added to his friend : 

“ Sorry, Tuck, if I seem lacking in respect for 
you and your wishes, but I really could n’t dismiss 
such a good cook because you think her a little bit 
40 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


too good-looking. She is a lovely little creature, 
is n’t she? ” 

“ She does n’t know her place.” 

Crane walked to the window and stood looking 
out for a minute, and then he said thoughtfully: 

“If ever I have a cat I shall name it Wil- 
loughby.” 

“ Have a cat ! ” cried Tucker. “ I thought you 
detested the animals as much as I do.” 

“ I felt rather attracted toward this one,” said 
Crane. 




41 


Ill 


H IS household cares disposed of, Crane went 
off to the stables. It was a soft hazy au- 
tumn morning, and though he walked along whis- 
tling his heart was heavy. These changes in back- 
ground always depressed him. His mother had 
been dead about two years, and at times like this 
he particularly missed her. She had always con- 
trived to make domestic difficulties not only un- 
important, but amusing: She had been pretty 
and young, both in years and spirit, and had had 
the determining influence on her son since his 
childhood. 

His parents had married early and impru- 
dently. The elder Crane, stung by some ill-con- 
sidered words of his wife’s family, had resolved 
from the first to make a successful career for him- 
self. Shrewd, hard and determined, he had not 
missed his mark. Burton’s earliest recollections 
of him were fleeting glimpses of a white, tired, 

42 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


silent man seldom, it seemed to him, at home, and, 
by his gracious absences, giving him. Burton, a 
sort of prior claim on all the time and all the at- 
tention of his mother. 

As he grew older and his father’s fortune ac- 
tually materialized, he began to see that it had 
never given pleasure to his mother, that it had 
first taken her husband’s time and strength away, 
and had then cha;iged the very stuff out of 
which the man was made. He had grown to love 
not only the game, but the rewards of the game. 
And Burton knew now that very early his mother 
'had begun deliberately to teach him the supreme 
importance of human relationships, that she had 
somehow inculcated in him a contempt not, per- 
haps, for money, but for those who valued money. 
Under her tuition he had absorbed a point of view 
not very usual among either rich or poor, namely 
that money like good health was excellent to have, 
chiefly because when you had it you did not have 
to think about it. 

Both her lessons were valuable to a young man 
left at twenty-five with a large fortune. But the 
second — the high delight in companionship — 
43 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


she had taught him through her own delightful 
personality, and her death left him desperately 
lonely. His loneliness made him, as one of his 
friends had said, extremely open to the dangers 
of matrimony, while on the other hand he had 
been rendered highly fastidious by his years of 
happy intimacy with his mother. Her wit and 
good temper he might have found in another 
woman — even possibly her concentrated interest 
in himself — but her fortunate sense of propor- 
tion, her knowledge in every-day life, as to what 
was trivial and what was essential, he found 
strangely lacking in all his other friends. 

He thought now how amusing she would have 
been about the manicured maid servants, and how, 
if he and she had been breakfasting together, 
they would have amused themselves by inventing 
fantastic explanations, instead of quarreling and 
sulking at each other as he and Tucker had done. 

Tucker had been his father’s lawyer. It had 
been one of the many contradictions in Mrs. 
Crane’s character that, though she ha.d always in- 
sisted that as a matter of loyalty to her husband 
Tucker should be retained as family adviser, she 
44 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


had never been able to conceal from Burton, even 
when he was still a boy, that she considered the 
lawyer an intensely comic character. 

She used to contrive to throw a world of sig- 
nificance into her pronunciation of his name, 
“ Solon.” Crane could still hear her saying it, 
as if she were indeed addressing the original law- 
giver; and it was largely because this recollec- 
tion was too vivid that he himself had taken to 
calling his counselor by his last name. 

He sighed as he thought of all this ; but he was'a 
young man, the day was fine and his horses an 
absorbing interest, and so he spent a very happy 
morning, passing his hand along doubtful fetlocks 
and withers, and consulting with his head man on 
all the infinity of detail which constitutes the chief 
joy of so many sports. 

At lunch, he appeared to be interested in noth- 
ing but the selection of the best mount for Miss 
Falkener — a state of mind which Tucker con- 
sidered a great deal more suitable than his former 
frivolous interest in cats. And soon after lunch 
was over he went off for a ride, so as to get it in 
before he had to go and meet his new guests. 

45 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


A back piazza ran past the dining-room win- 
dows. It was shady and contained a long wicker- 
chair. The November afternoon was warm, and 
here Tucker decided to rest, possibly to sleep, in 
order to recuperate from a disturbing night and 
morning. 

He contrived to make himself very comfortable 
with a sofa pillow and extra overcoat. He slept 
indeed so long that when he woke the light was 
beginning to fade. He lay quiet a few moments, 
thinking that Mrs. Falkener would soon arrive 
and revolving the best and most encouraging terms 
in which he could describe the situation to her, 
when he became aware of voices. His piazza 
was immediately above the kitchen door, and it 
was clear that some one had just entered the 
kitchen from outdoors. And he heard a voice, 
unmistakably Jane-Ellen’s, say: 

“ Stranger, see how glad Willoughby is to see 
you again.' Just think, he has n’t laid eyes on you 
for all of three days.” 

Tucker could not catch the answer which was 
made in a deep masculine voice, but it was easy 
to guess its import from the reply of Jane-Ellen. 

46 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ Oh, I ’m glad to see you, too.” 

Another murmur. 

“ How do you expect me to show it? ” 

A murmur. 

“ Don’t be absurd, Ranny.” And she added 
quite audibly: “If you really want proof. I’ll 
give it to you. I was just thinking I needed some 
one to help me freeze the ice-cream. Give it a 
turn or two, will you, like a dear? ” 

It was obvious that the visitor was of a docile 
nature, for presently the faint regular squeak of 
an ice-cream freezer was heard. His heart was 
not wholly in his work, however, for soon he 
began to complain. Tucker gathered that the 
freezer was set outside the kitchen door, and that 
the visitor now had to raise his voice slightly in 
order to be heard in the kitchen, for both speakers 
were audible. 

“ Yes,” said the visitor, “ that ’s the way you 
are. You expect every one to work for you.” 

“Don’t you enjoy working for me, Ranny? 
You ’ve always said it was the one thing in the 
world gave you pleasure.” 

“ Humph,” returned the other grimly, “ I 
47 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


don’t know that I am so eager to freeze Crane’s 
ice-cream.” 

“ And Mr. Tucker’s, don’t forget him.” 

“ Who the deuce is Tucker? ” 

The listener above sat up and leaned forward 
eagerly. 

“ Tucker,” said Jane-Ellen, “ is our guest at 
present. He ’s my favorite and Willoughby’s. 
He has what you might call a virile, dominating 
personality. Please don’t turn so fast, or you ’ll 
ruin the dessert.” 

“ How did you ever come in contact with 
Tucker, I should like to know. Does he come 
into the kitchen?” 

“ Not yet.” 

“ How did you see him at all? ” 

“ Owing to his kicking Willoughby down the 
stairs.” 

“And you mean to say you stood for that? 
Why, my dear girl, if any one had told me — ” 

“ Cruel, perhaps, Ranny, but the action of a 
strong man.” 

“ I think it ’s a great mistake,” said the mas- 
culine voice in a tone of profound displeasure, 
48 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ for a girl situated as you are to have anything 
to do with her employer and his guests. What 
do you know about these fellows? How old is 
this Tucker? ” 

“ Oh, about forty, I should think.” 

The listener’s eyes brightened by ten years. 

“ What does he look like ? ” 

“ Oh, people are so difficult to describe, 
Ranny.” 

“You can describe them all right when you 
try.” 

“ Well,”. . . Tucker’s excitement became in- 
tense . . .“ well, he looks like the husband on 
the stage with a dash of powder above the ears, 
who wins the weak young wife back again in the 
last act.” 

With a long deep breath. Tucker rose to his 
feet. He felt like a different man, a strong, dan- 
gerous fellow. 

“ Dear girl,” said the masculine voice below 
him, “ you ’re not going to let this man make love 
to you.” 

“ Oh, Ranny, he ’s never tried. He ’s much 
too dignified and reserved.” 

49 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


“ But if he did try, you would not let him? ” 

“ You, if any one, ought to know that it is n’t 
always easy to prevent.” 

‘‘ I don’t know what you mean by that. 
You ’ve always prevented me, as often as you 
wanted to.” 

“ Often, but not as often as that. There, 
Ranny, do get on with the ice-cream. That ter- 
rible old woman is coming to stay this evening 
with her daughter, and you may be sure she ’ll 
have us all turned out if everything is n’t just 
right.” 

“ Crane is supposed to be engaged to the daugh- 
ter,” said the male voice, 

“ Well, I don’t envy him his mother-in-law.” 

“ What do you think of Crane? ” 

There was a pause. At first Tucker feared he 
might have missed the answer, but presently the 
question was repeated. 

“ I asked you what you thought of Crane.” 

“ Oh, I ’ve seen a good many young men of 
that type in my time,” was the reply. 

“ How strange women are,” remarked the ice- 
cream maker, who had now once again settled 

50 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

down to work. “ I should have thought Crane 
just the man to attract women, well built, good- 
looking, a splendid horseman — ” 

“ Would you say good-looking? ” asked the 
cook. Tucker had been putting exactly the same 
question to himself. 

But the speaker did not intend to answer it, 
he went on with his own train of thought: “ And 
here you go into raptures over an old fellow, old 
enough to be your father — ” 

“ Should you say I went into raptures? ” 

“ You talk as if you were prepared to make an 
idol of the man.” 

A pleasant laugh greeted this statement. 
Tucker grew grave. He did not feel that he 
thoroughly understood the cause of that laugh, 
but he took refuge in that comfortable and 
all-embracing theory that women were fond, 
unaccountable creatures, particularly when deeply 
moved. 

Another explanation was offered by the man 
below. 

“ I believe you are just trying to tease me, 
Jane-Ellen.” 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


Trying, Ranny?” 

“ You know very well you can always do what- 
ever you like with me.” The voice deepened 
with emotion. 

“ Oh, dear me, no, I can’t.” 

“Why not?” 

“ I can’t keep you turning steadily at that crank. 
Here, let me show you how It ought to be done.” 

Tucker knew that she had come out of the 
kitchen. By leaning over the railing he could 
see the kitchen door. 

He leant over. 

The space before the entrance was paved In 
large square flagstones; here an Ice-cream freezer 
was standing, and over It bent a young man of a 
somewhat solid build, but with the unmistakable 
manner and bearing of a gentleman. He straight- 
ened himself as Jane-Ellen came out, and watched 
her closely as she grasped the handle of the 
freezer; but It seemed to the spectator above that 
he watched her with other emotions than the sin- 
cere wish to learn the correct mapner of freezing. 

Tucker looked straight down upon her, upon 
the part in her light brown hair, upon her round 

52 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


little arms, for her sleeves were rolled up above 
the elbow, as she said didactically : 

“ It ought to be a steady, even — ” 

But she got no further, for her pupil without 
a word, stooped forward and gathering her into 
his arms, kissed her. 


53 


IV 


HERE was no doubt whatsoever In the mind 



X of the spectator that this caress, provoked 
or unprovoked, was not agreeable to Its recipient. 
The young man was large and heavy and she was 
minute and probably weak, but the violence of 
her recoil was sufficient to free her within a sec- 


ond. 


“ ‘ Her strength,’ ” thought Tucker, “ ‘ was as 
the strength of ten,’ ” and he hoped It was for the 
reason alleged by the poet. 

She stood an Instant looking at her visitor, and 
then she said. In a tone that no well-trained dog 
would have attempted to disobey: 

“ Go away. Go home, and please don’t ever 
come back.” 

Tucker was deeply moved. It Is to be feared 
that he forgot Mrs. Falkener, forgot his plans 
for his friend’s protection, forgot everything ex- 
cept that he had just heard himself described as 


54 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


a hero of romance by a girl of superlative charms ; 
and that that girl had just been the object of the 
obviously unwelcome attentions of another. He 
recognized that the stern but sympathetic husband 
on the stage would instantly have come to the res- 
cue of the weak young wife in any similar situa- 
tion, and he determined on the instant to do so; 
but he found a slight difficulty in making up his 
mind as to the particular epigram with which he 
should enter. In fact, he could think of nothing 
except, “ Ah, Jane-Ellen, is the ice-cream ready? ” 
And that obviously would n’t do. 

While, however, he hesitated above, the dia- 
logue below rushed on, unimpeded. 

“ The truth is,” said the young man, with the 
violence of one who feels himself at least par- 
tially in the wrong, “ the truth is you are a cold, 
cruel woman who thinks of nothing but her own 
amusement; you don’t care anything about the suf- 
ferings of others, and in my opinion Lily is worth 
ten of you.” 

“ Then why don’t you go and kiss Lily? ” 

“ Because Lily is n’t that sort. She would n’t 
stand it.” 


55 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


This reply not unnaturally angered the cook. 

“ And do you mean to say I stand it? I can’t 
help it. I ’m so horribly small, but if I could, I ’d 
kill you, Randolph, and as it is, I hate you for do- 
ing it, hate you more than you have any idea.” 

“You know very well it ’s your own fault. You 
tempted me.” 

“ How could I know about your silly lack of 
self-control? ” 

“ You ’ve always pretended to like me.” 

“ Just what I did — pretended. But I ’ll never 
have to pretend again, thank heaven. I don’t 
really like you and I never did — not since we 
were children.” 

“ You ’ll be sorry for saying that, when you ’re 
calmer.” 

“ I may be sorry for saying it, but I ’ll think it 
as long as I live.” 

“ I pity the man who marries you, my girl. 
You ’ve a bitter tongue.” 

“ You ’d marry me to-morrow, if you could.” 

“ I would not.” 

“ You would.” 

“ Not if you were the last woman in the world.” 

56 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


“ Good night.” 

“ Good-by.” 

The culprit seized his hat and rushed away 
through the shadows before Tucker had time to 
think out the dignified rebuke that he had in- 
tended. 

There was a pause. He was conscious that an 
opportunity had slipped from him. He knew 
now what he ought to have said. He should have 
asked the young fellow — who was clearly a gen- 
tleman, far above Jane-Ellen In social position — . 
whether that was the way he would have treated 
a girl in his own mother’s drawing-room, and 
whether he considered that less chivalry was due 
to a working girl than to a woman of leisure. 

Though his great opportunity was gone, he de- 
cided to do whatever remained. After a short 
hesitation he descended a flight of steps at one 
end of the piazza. The kitchen opened before 
him, large and cavernous. Two lamps hardly 
served to light it. It was red tiled; round its 
walls hung large, bright, copper saucepans, and 
on shelves of oak along its sides were rows of 
dark blue and white plates and dishes. 

57 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


Tucker was prepared to find the cook in tears, 
in which case he had a perfectly definite idea as to 
what to do; but the disconcerting young woman 
was moving rapidly about the kitchen, humming 
to herself. She held a small but steaming sauce- 
pan in her hand, which was, as Tucker swiftly re- 
flected, a much better weapon than the handle of 
an ice-cream freezer. 

“ Good evening, Jane-Ellen,” he said graciously. 

“ Good evening, sir.” 

She did not even look in his direction, but bent 
witch-like over a cauldron. 

“ I wished to speak to you,” he said, “ about 
that little incident of this morning. You must 
not think that I am by nature cruel or indifferent 
to animals. On the contrary, I am a life mem- 
ber in the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to 
them. I love animals.” And as if to prove his 
words, he put out his hand and gently pulled the 
ears of Willoughby, who was asleep in a chair. 
Cats’ ears are extraordinarily sensitive, and 
Willoughby woke up and withdrew his head with 
a jerk. 

Willoughby’s mistress, on the other hand, made 

58 


“You had better be careful, sir^* 












COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


no reply whatsoever; indeed it would have been 
impossible to be sure she had heard. 

“ How different she is,” thought Tucker, “ in 
the presence of a man she really respects, and rec- 
ognizes as her superior. All the levity and co- 
quetry disappear from her bearing.” 

“ I was truly sorry,” he went on, drawing 
nearer and nearer to the range, “ to have been the 
occasion — ” 

“ You had better be careful, sir,” she said, still 
without looking at him, “ these sauces sometimes 
boil over.” And as she spoke she put a spoon 
into the pan, and the next instant Tucker felt a 
small but burning drop fall upon his hand. He 
started back with an exclamation. 

“ I am truly sorry, sir,” she said, “ to have been 
the occasion — ” 

He glanced at her sharply. Was she conscious 
of repeating his own phrase? She seemed to 
be wholly absorbed in her task. He noticed 
how prettily the hair grew at the back of 
her neck, how small and well shaped were her 
ears. His manner became even more protect- 
ing. 


6i 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ I am an older man than your employer — ” 
he began. 

“ Yes, indeed, sir.” 

He decided not to notice the interruption. 

“ I am older and have seen more of life. I 
understand more, perhaps, of the difficulties of a 
young, and I must say, beautiful woman, Jane- 
Ellen — ” 

“ Why must you say that, sir ? ” Her eyes 
fixed themselves on his. 

“ Because it is the truth, my dear child.” He 
again approached the range, but as a fountain in- 
stantly rose from the sauce he retreated and con- 
tinued: “ I would like, if any little troubles in 
the household arise, to know that you look upon 
me as a friend, both you and Willoughby.” (He 
thought it not amiss to introduce the comic note 
now and again.) “ I have some influence with 
Mr. Crane. I should be glad to do you a good 
turn.” 

“ You can do me one now, sir.” 

“ Pray, tell me what it is.” 

“ You can go away and let me get the dinner.” 

“You want me to go?” 

62 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


“ The kitchen Is no place for gentlemen.” 

Tucker laughed tolerantly. 

“ Did you think so ten minutes ago? ” 

For the second time she looked in his direction, 
as she asked quickly: 

“ What do you mean? ” 

“ Your last visitor was not so respectful.” 

She had put down the saucepan now, and 
so he approached and tried to take her 
hand. 

Perhaps this is as good a time as any other to 
describe the sensation of taking Jane-EIlen’s hand. 
The ordinary mortal put out an ordinary hand, 
and touched something, something presumably 
flesh and blood, but so light, so soft, so pliant, that 
it seemed literally to melt into the folds of his 
palm, so that even after the hand had been with- 
drawn (and in this instance It was instantly with- 
drawn) the feeling seemed to remain, and Tucker 
found himself staring at his own fingers to see if 
they did not still bear traces of that remarkable 
contact. 

It was just at this moment that Brindlebury en- 
tered the kitchen and said, in a tone which no one 

63 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


could have considered respectful, that the motor 
was coming up the drive. 

Tucker was more apt to meet an awkward sit- 
uation — and the situation was slightly awkward 
— by an additional dignity of manner rather than 
by any ill-considered action. 

“ Ah,” he now observed, “ in that case I think 
I must go and meet it.” 

“ I think I would, if I were you,” replied the 
boy, and added to the cook, in case there was any 
mistake about his meaning: “ It seems to me 
there are too many men in this kitchen in the 
course of the day.” 

“ Well, goodness knows they ’re not here to 
please me,” said Jane-Ellen. 

Tucker, who understood that this reply had to 
be made, wished, nevertheless, that she had not 
made it with such a convincing sincerity of man- 
ner. He turned and left the kitchen, and, as he 
went up the piazza stairs, became aware that the 
boy was following him. 

He stood still at the top, therefore, and asked 
with that hectoring tone which many people think 
so d'“sirable to use with servants : 

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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“What’s this? You wish to speak to me?” 

The boy hardly troubled to approximate civility 
as he answered: 

“ Yes; I just wanted to tell you that Jane-Ellen 
Is my sister.” 

Tucker laughed with indulgent good hu- 
mor. 

“ Indeed,” he said. “ Well, I cannot confess, 
Brindlebury, to taking a very deep interest in your 
family relations.” 

“ It ’s this much interest, that I don’t want you 
going into the kitchen to talk to her.” 

“ Tut, tut,” said Tucker. “ I think I shall 
have to report you to your employer.” 

“ And I may have to report you.” 

This was so beyond the bounds of convention 
that Tucker thought best to ignore it. He merely 
turned on his heel and walked into the house, 
where, in the hall, he found the two Falkener 
ladies taking off their coats. 

Mrs. Falkener was all graciousness. She was 
engaged in unwinding a veil from her face, and 
as she freed her nose from its meshes she said 
briskly : 


65 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“And how is the housekeeping going? How 
is your staff working? ” 

Crane got them Into the drawing-room, where 
tea was waiting. Mrs. Falkener spoke to him, 
but she cast a secret glance of question at Tucker. 
Under most circumstances he would have replied 
by raising his eyebrows, shrugging his shoulders, 
closing his eyes, or conveying In some manner the 
true reply to her demand. But now he merely 
looked into his teacup, which he was diligently 
stirring. He found himself uncertain what to do. 
He had no Intention of mentioning the afternoon’s 
Incidents to Crane. He did not wish, he told 
himself, to tell on a poor young woman, and per- 
haps deprive her of her job. Besides, it Is very 
difficult to tell a story in which you have been an 
eavesdropper, and tell it with any sort of flourish 
and satisfaction. The geography of the balcony 
was such that he would have to confess either to 
having leaned as far over the rail as possible, or 
else to having been in the kitchen. But the in- 
solence of the boy Brindlebury put a new face on 
the matter. He deserved reproof, to say noth- 
ing of the fact that he might tell in a mistaken de- 
66 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


sire to protect his sister from annoyance. To 
tell any of this to Mrs. Falkener was to put a 
weapon in her hands which she would not fail to 
use to get Jane-Ellen out of the house within 
twenty-four hours. Tucker’s first idea was that 
he did not wish Jane-Ellen to leave the house. 

But, as he sat stirring his tea, another thought 
came to him. Why should she not leave, why 
should she not become his own cook? Crane, 
after all, only offered her employment for a few 
weeks, whereas he — He decided that it would 
be better for Crane to get rid of her; he decided, 
as he put it to himself, to be perfectly open with 
his friend. If Crane turned her out, then he. 
Tucker, would be there, helpful and ready, like 
the competent middle-aged hero of the drama, 
whom she herself had so well described. 

He joined but little in the conversation round 
the tea-table, and Mrs. Falkener, watching him 
narrowly, feared from his gravity that something 
serious had happened, that the situation was worse 
than she had imagined. What, she wondered, 
had occurred in the last twenty- four hours? 
What had those evil women with manicured nails 

67 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


accomplished in her absence? She manoeuvered 
two or three times to get a word with Tucker, but 
he seemed unconscious of her efforts. 

When at last they all agreed it was time to dress 
for dinner, Tucker laid a detaining hand on his 
host’s arm. 

“ Could I have just a word with you, Burt?” 
he said. 

Crane always felt like a naughty child when his 
friend spoke to him like this. 

“ Would n’t later do ? ” he asked. “ I want to 
get a bath before dinner, and if we keep it wait- 
ing we may spoil some of those wonderful dishes 
that star-eyed beauty in the kitchen is preparing 
for us.” 

“ It is about her I want to speak to you.” 

Both ladies and Crane turned instantly at these 
words. Then the Falkeners with a strong effort 
of self-control left the room, and the two men 
were alone. 

“ Well, what is it? ” said Crane, rather sharply. 

Tucker was now all suavity. 

“ I ’m afraid, after all,” he began, sitting down 
and swinging one leg over the other, “ that you 
68 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


won’t be able to keep that young person. I ’m 
afraid Mrs. Falkener was right. Women know 
these things at a glance.” 

“ What things? ” 

“ Why, I mean that in spite of her good din- 
ner, I ’m afraid your cook, Burt, is not — Well, 
I ’d better tell you just what is in my mind.” 

“ Surely, if you can,” said his host and client. 
“ I went out for a little while about dusk on 
the back piazza, which you know is just above the 
kitchen, and a conversation below is audible there. 
At first I did not pay much attention to the mur- 
mur of voices, but gradually 1 became aware that 
some one was making love to Jane-Ellen — ” 
“Who was it?” asked Crane. “That 
wretched boy? That smug butler? ” 

“ Alas, no,” said Tucker. “ If it had been 
one of the other servants I should not have 
thought it much harm. Unhappily, it was a 
young gentleman, a person so much her social su- 
perior — Well, my dear fellow, you get the 
idea.” 

“ No one you knew, of course? ” 

“ I never saw him before.” 

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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


“How did you see him at all?” 

This was the question that Tucker had been 
anticipating. 

“ Why, to tell you the truth, Burt,” he said, 
“ when I realized what was going on, I thought 
it my duty for your sake to find out. I looked 
over the railing — and just at the psychological 
moment when he kissed her.” 

Crane was tapping a cigarette thoughtfully on 
the palm of his hand, and did not at once answer. 
When he did, he looked up with a smile, and 
said: 

“ Lucky dog, is what I say. Tuck.” 

“ I don’t think,” answered his friend, “ that 
that is quite the right attitude for you to assume.” 

“ What do you think I should do? ” 

“ Dismiss the girl.” 

Another pause. 

“ Or,” added Tucker, magnanimously, “ if you 
shrink from the interview, I shall be very glad to 
do it for you.” 

Crane looked up. 

“ No, thank you,” he said. “ I think you have 
done quite enough. I should not dream of im- 
70 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


posing upon you further.” He walked to the bell 
and rang it. Smithfield appeared. 

“ Tell the cook I want to see her,” he said. 

After a brief absence Smithfield returned. 

“ I beg pardon, sir,” he said, “ but the cook 
says If she leaves dinner now it will be spoiled, 
and won’t after dinner do? ” 

Crane nodded. 

“ You know,” said Tucker when they were 
again alone, “ It is not always necessary to tell 
servants why you are dispensing with their serv- 
ices. You might say — ” 

Much to his surprise. Crane Interrupted him 
with a laugh. 

“ My dear Tuck,” he said, “ you don’t really 
suppose, do you, that I am going to dismiss that 
peerless woman just because you saw an ill-man- 
nered fellow kiss her ? I shall administer a telling 
rebuke with a slight sketch of my notions on fe- 
male deportnient. It would take more than that 
to Induce me to send her away. Indeed, I was 
thinking of taking her North with me.” 

This was a serious suggestion, but Tucker could 
think of no better way to meet it than to raise his 

71 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


eyebrows; and Crane went off whistling to dress 
for dinner. 

He whistled not only going upstairs, but he 
whistled in his bath and while he was shaving. 
The sound annoyed Tucker in the next room. 

“ It almost seems,” he thought, “ as if he were 
glad to see the woman again on any terms.” And 
yet, he. Tucker, knew that she considered Crane 
quite a commonplace young man — not at all like 
a hero in the third act. 

The way Crane had taken his suggestions was 
distressing. Tucker did not feel that he thor- 
oughly understood what was in the younger man’s 
mind. His first intention to tell Mrs. Falkener 
nothing began to fade. It would have been all 
very well If Burton had been sensible and had been 
willing to send the cook away and he. Tucker, had 
been able to engage her, to ignore the whole mat- 
ter to Mrs. Falkener. Indeed, it would have 
been hard to explain It. But, of course, if Burton 
was going to be obstinate about it, Mrs. Falkener’s 
aid might be absolutely necessary. 

“ After all,” he thought, “ candor Is the best 
policy among friends.” 


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He dressed quickly and was not mistaken in his 
belief that Mrs. Falkener would have done the 
same. She was waiting for him in the drawing- 
room. They had a clear fifteen minutes before 
dinner. 

“ Now tell me, my dear Solon,” she said, “ just 
what you think of the situation.” 

“ I think badly of it.” 

“ Yes,” said Mrs. Falkener, not yet quite appre- 
ciating the seriousness of his tone. “ I do, my- 
self. That idiotic housemaid, Lily — I could 
have told him that name would never do — 
hooked me twice wrong, and left my daughter’s 
dirty boots on top of her best tea-gown.” 

“ Ah, if incompetence were all we had to com- 
plain of! ” 

“ The cook? ” 

“ Is perfection, as far as cooking goes. But 
in other respects — Really, my dear Mrs. Falk- 
ener, I am in doubt whether you should let your 
daughter stay in this house — at least, until Bur- 
ton comes to his senses.” 

I 

“ You must tell me just what you mean.” 

Tucker decided to tell the story reluctantly. 

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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


“ Why, it happened this afternoon, Burton was 
away with his horses, and quite by accident I came 
upon his pretty cook in the arms of a strange 
young man, a person vastly her social superior, 
one of the young landholders of the neighborhood, 
I should say. Seemed to assume the most confi- 
dent right to be in Burton’s kitchen — a man he 
may know in the hunting field, may have to dinner 
to-morrow. I don’t know who he is, but certainly 
a gentleman.” 

“ How very unpleasant,” said Mrs. Falkener. 
“ Did the woman take in that you had detected 
her?” 

“ Yes, and seemed quite unabashed.” 

“ And now I suppose you are hesitating whether 
or not to tell Burton? ” 

Tucker was naturally cautious. 

“ And what would you advise? ” 

“ It is your duty to tell him at once, and get such 
a person out of the house.” 

“ You think if I told him, he would dismiss 
her?” 

“ I am confident he would, unless — ” 

” Unless?” 


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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

“ Unless he has himself some interest in her.” 

“ Ah,” said Tucker, with a deep sigh, “ that’s 
the question.” 

At this moment Miss Falkener, looking very 
handsome in a sapphire-colored dress, came in. 
She, too, perhaps, had expected that somebody 
would be dressed a little ahead of time for the 
sake of a few minutes’ private talk. If so, she 
was disappointed. 

“ Ah, Cora,” said her mother brightly, “ let us 
hear how the piano sounds. Give us some of 
that delightful Chopin you were playing last even- 
ing.” 

Cora, to show her independence of spirit, sat 
down and began to play ragtime, but neither of her 
auditors noticed the difference. 

“ You mean,” whispered Mrs. Falkener, “ that 
you have reason to suppose that Crane him- 
self—?” 

“ Why, to be candid, my dear lady,” replied 
Tucker, “ I did tell him. You may have noticed 
I seemed a trifle abstracted at tea time. I was 
considering what it was best to do. Well, when 
you left us, I told him. What do you think he 
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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

said? ‘ Lucky dog.’ That was all. Just ‘ lucky 
dog.’ ” 

“ Meaning you? ” 

“ No, no, meaning the fellow who had been 
kissing the cook.” 

“ Dear me,” said Mrs. Falkener, “ how very 
light minded.” 

“ It shocked me — to have him take it like that. 
And he would not hear of dismissing her. He 
intends merely to reprove her, so he says. But 
what reproof is possible? And the most alarm- 
ing feature of the whole situation is that, to 
my opinion, he is looking forward to the inter- 
view.” 

“ The woman must be sent out of the house 
immediately,” said Mrs. Falkener with decision. 
“ I wonder if higher wages would tempt her?” 

“ I see your idea,” answered Tucker. “ You 
think I ought to offer a position. I would do 
more than that to save Burt.” 

“ A position as cook, you mean? ” 

“ Why, Mrs. Falkener, what else could I 
mean? ” 

“ Oh, nothing, Solon, I only thought — ” 

76 



I ' 





I 




% 


» 


t 


♦ 







V 


S 





1 



COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


The friends were still explaining away the lit- 
tle misunderstanding when Crane came down, and 
dinner was announced. 

Mrs. Falkener, with of course the heartiest 
wish to criticize, was forced to admit the food 
was perfection. The soup so clear and strong, 
the fried fish so dry and tender, even the cheese 
souffle, for which she had waited most hopefully, 
turned out to be beautifully light and fluffy. Hav- 
ing come to- curse she was obliged to bless ; and her 
praise was delightful to Crane. 

“Yes, isn’t she a wonder?” he kept saying. 
“ Was n’t it great luck to find any one like that in 
a place such as this ? Tuck, here, keeps trying to 
poison my mind against her, but I would n’t part 
with a cook like that even if she were a Mes- 
sallna.” 

Mrs. Falkener, who could n’t on the instant re- 
member who Messallna was, attempted to look as 
if she thought it would be better not to mention 
such people in the presence of her daughter. 

“ Tuck’s an inhuman old creature, is n’t he, 
Mrs. Falkener? ” Crane went on. “ I don’t be- 
lieve he ever had a natural Impulse in his life, and 
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so he has no sympathy with the impulses of 
others.” 

Tucker smiled quietly. It came to him that 
just so the Iron reserve of the middle-aged hero 
was often misinterpreted during the first two acts 
by more frivolous members of the cast. 

As they rose from table, Miss Falkener said: 

“ It ’s such a lovely night. Such a moon. 
Have you seen it, Mr. Crane? ” 

“ Well, I saw It as we drove over from the sta- 
tion,” returned Crane, a trifle absently. He had 
become thoughtful as dinner ended. 

“ Do you think,” said Cora, “ that it would be 
too cold to take a turn In the garden? I should 
like to see the old box and the cedars by moon- 
light.” ,, 

“Not a bit. Let ’s go out. I have something 
to do first, but It won’t take me ten minutes. 
But,” he added, “ you must not catch cold and 
get laid up, and miss the run to-morrow. I ’m 
going to put you on a new Irish mare I ’ve just 
bought.” And they found themselves talking not 
about the garden, but the stable. 

In the midst of it Smithfield came into the draw- 
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ing-room with the coffee, and Crane said to him, 
in a low tone : 

“ Oh, Smithfield, tell the cook I ’ll see her now, 
in the little office across the hall.” 

Smithfield looked graver than usual. 

“ Beg pardon, sir,” he said, “ but the cook was 
feeling tired and has gone up to bed, sir.” 

Crane was just helping himself to sugar. 

“ She cooked this coffee, didn’t she?” he said. 

“ Yes, sir.” 

“ She can’t have been gone very long then.” 

“ About five minutes, sir.” 

“ Go up and tell her to come down,” said Crane. 

He turned again to Miss Falkener and went on 
about the past performances of the Irish mare, 
but it was quite clear to all who heard him that his 
heart was no longer in the topic. 

Smithfield’s return was greeted by complete 
silence. 

“Well?” said Crane sharply. 

“ Beg pardon, sir,” said Smithfield, “ Jane- 
Ellen says that she is very tired, and that if the 
morning will do — ” 

“The morning will not do,” answered Crane, 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


with a promptness unusual in him. “ Go up and 
tell her that if she is not in my office within ten 
minutes, I ’ll come up myself.” 

Smithfield bowed and withdrew. 

Silence again descended on the room. Mrs. 
Falkener and Tucker were silent because they both 
felt that thus their faces expressed more plainly 
than words could do that this was just about what 
they had expected. But Cora, who was young 
enough to understand that anger may be a form of 
interest, watched him with a strangely wistful ex- 
pression. 

After what seemed to every one an interminable 
delay, Smithfield entered again. He looked pale 
and graver than any one had ever seen his habitu- 
ally grave countenance. 

“ Jane-Ellen is in your office now, sir,” he said. 

Crane rose at once and left the room followed 
by Smithfield. 


82 


V 


J ANE-ELLEN was standing in the office, with 
her hands folded, and an expression of the ut- 
most calm upon her face. Crane came in quickly 
and would have shut the door, but for the fact 
that Smithfield was immediately behind him. 

“ Beg pardon, sir,” he said firmly, sliding into 
the room, “ but I must look to the fire.” 

Crane frowned. 

“ The fire ’s all right,” he said shortly. 

But Smithfield was not to be put off his duties, 
and began to poke the logs and sweep the hearth 
until peremptorily ordered to go. 

When the door finally closed behind him. Crane 
stood silent a moment with his hand on the mantel- 
piece. The whole tone of the interview, upon 
which it now occurred to him he had rushed some- 
what too hastily, would be decided by whether he 
spoke standing up or sitting down. His feelings 
were for the first, his intellect for the latter posi- 
tion- 


83 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


His intellect won. He sat down in a deep chair 
and crossed his legs. As he did so, the cook’s 
eyes, which had hitherto been fixed on the carpet, 
now raised themselves to the level of his neat 
pumps and black silk socks. He was aware of 
this, but did not allow himself to be disconcerted. 

“ I suppose you can guess why I sent for you, 
Jane-Ellen,” he said. 

“The dinner was not satisfactory, sir?” 

“ I doubt if you could cook an unsatisfactory 
dinner if you tried,” he returned. “ No, the 
trouble is over something that happened an hour 
or so before dinner.” 

“ You did not approve, perhaps, of that gentle- 
man, Mr. Tucker, coming into the kitchen? But, 
indeed, I could not help that.” 

“ Oh,” said Crane, “ so Tucker was in the 
kitchen, was he ? ” 

“Yes, sir, until Brindlebury told him the motor 
was coming with the ladies.” 

“ No,” said Crane, “ the difficulty is over a 
former visitor of yours. I think it my right, even 
my duty to prevent anything happening in this 
house of which I disapprove, and I do not ap- 
84 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


prove, Jane-Ellen, of strangers coming into my 
house and kissing the cook.” 

He looked at her squarely as he said this, but 
her eyes remained fixed on his feet as she replied 
docilely : 

“ Yes, sir. Perhaps it would be better for you 
to speak to the young man about it.” 

“ Ah,” returned her employer, as one now go- 
ing over familiar ground, “ you mean to imply 
that it was not your fault? ” 

She did not directly answer this question. She 
said: 

“ I suppose in your class of life a gentleman 
would not under any circumstances kiss a young 
lady against her will? ” 

“ Well,” answered Crane, with some amuse- 
ment, “ he certainly never ought to do so. And 
by the way, one of the points about this incident 
seems to be that the young man in question had 
the appearance of being a gentleman.” 

“ He certainly considers himself so.” 

There was a pause, then Crane said, seriously: 

“ I don’t want to interfere in your concerns fur- 
ther than I have to, or to offer you advice — ” 

85 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


“ But I should be so glad to have you offer me 
advice, sir. It is one of the few things a gentle- 
man may offer a girl in my position and she accept 
with a clear conscience.” 

For the first time Crane looked at her with sus- 
picion. Her tone and look were demure in the ex- 
treme. He decided to go on. 

“ Well, then,” he said, “ if I were you I would 
not have a gentleman, especially such an impulsive 
one, hanging about, unless you are engaged to him 
with the consent of your family.” 

She raised her chin, without lifting her eyes. 

“ It ’s not the consent of our families that ’s 
lacking,” she remarked. 

“ Oh, he ’s asked you to marry him? ” 

“ Almost every day, sir, until to-day.” 

“And to-day he didn’t?” 

“ To-day he said he would n’t marry me, if I 
were the last woman in the world.” 

“ And what did you think about that? ” 

“ I thought it was n’t true, sir.” 

Crane laughed aloud at this direct answer. 

“ And it sounds to me as if you were right, 
Jane-Ellen,” he said. “ But, at the same time, I 
86 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


can’t see for the life of me why, if you don’t mean 
to marry him, you let him kiss you.” 

“ If you please, sir, it ’s not always possible to 
prevent. You see I ’m not very large.” 

Crane looked at her, and had to admit that the 
feat would be extremely easy. She hardly came to 
one’s shoulder; almost any man — Hastily put- 
ting aside this train of thought, he said in a more 
judicial tone: 

“ You know your own affairs best. Is the 
young man able to support you ? ” 

“ Yes, sir, very comfortably.” 

“ And yet you don’t consider marrying him? ” 

“ No, sir. I don’t love him.” 

Matters had suddenly become rather serious. 

“ You would rather work for your living than 
marry a man you don’t love ? ” Crane asked, al- 
most in spite of himself. 

For the first time the cook looked up, straight at 
him, as she answered : 

“ I think I would rather die, sir.” 

This time it was Crane’s eyes that dropped. 
Fortunately, he reflected, she could not have any 
idea how sharply her remark had touched his own 

87 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


inner state. How clearly she saw that it was 
wrong to do just what he was contemplating doing 
— to marry for prudence, rather than for love. 
He found himself speculating on the genesis of the 
moral sense, how it developed in difficulties rather 
than in ease. That was why he could learn some- 
thing on the subject from his cook. Here was a 
girl working for her living, working hard and 
long, for wages which though he had once, he re- 
membered, told Reed they seemed excessive, now 
appeared to him the merest pittance; certainly it 
seemed as if all the hardships of such a life would 
be smoothed away by this suggested marriage, and 
yet she could assert clearly that she would rather 
die than make it; whereas he, with nothing very 
much at stake, had actually been contemplating 
for several months the making of just such a mar- 
riage — He was interrupted by her respectful 
tones : 

“ Will that be all, sir?” 

“ Yes,” he answered in a voice that lacked fi- 
nality. “ I suppose that ’s all, except if that fel- 
low comes bothering you any more, let me know, 
and I ’ll tell him what I think of him.” 

88 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


Jane-Ellen lifted the corner of her mouth in a 
terrible smile. 

“ Oh,” she said, “ I don’t think he ’ll come 
bothering any more.” 

“ You ’re very optimistic, Jane-Ellen.” 

“ I beg your pardon, sir, those long words — ” 

“ Very hopeful, I meant. He ’ll be back to- 
morrow.” 

“ Not after what I said to him.” 

“ Well, Jane-Ellen, if you have really found 
the potent thing to say under such circumstances, 
you ’re a true benefactor to your sex.” 

She looked at him with mild confusion. 

“ I ’m afraid I don’t rightly understand, sir.” 

He smiled. 

“ It was my way of asking you what you had 
said to him that you imagined would keep him 
from coming back.” 

“ I told him I had only pretended to like him, 
all these years. People, particularly gentlemen, 
don’t like to think you have to pretend to like 
them.” 

Crane laughed aloud, wondering if the girl had 
any idea how amusing she was. In the pause that 
89 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


followed, the sound of a deep masculine voice 
could be heard suddenly under their feet. The 
office was immediately above the servants’ sitting- 
room, and it was but too evident that a visitor 
had just entered. 

Crane looked at the cook questioningly, and she 
had the grace to color. 

“ Why, did you ever, sir,” she said. “ There 
he is, this very moment 1 ” 

“ Shall I go down and forbid him the house? ” 
asked Burton, and though he spoke in fun, he 
would have been delighted to act in earnest. 

“ Oh, no, sir, thank you,” she answered. “ I 
am not going back to the kitchen.” 

This reminded her employer of the extreme dif- 
ficulty he had experienced in seeing his cook at all. 

“ Why did you try and get out of seeing me, 
Jane-Ellen?” he said. “You knew about what 
I had to say, I suppose? ” 

“ I had a notion, sir.” 

“ And were you afraid? ” 

At this question, the cook bent her head until a 
shadow fell upon it, but Crane had a clear impres- 
sion that she was laughing, so clear that he said: 

90 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ And may I ask why it is a comic idea that a 
servant should be afraid of her employer? ” 

The cook now raised a mask-like face and said 
most respectfully: 

“ No, sir, I was not exactly afraid,” and, hav- 
ing said this, without the slightest warning she 
burst into an unmistakable giggle. 

Nobody probably enjoys finding that the idea 
of his inspiring terror is merely ludicrous. Crane 
regarded his cook with a sternness that was not 
entirely false. She, still struggling to regain 
complete gravity at the corners of her mouth, said 
civilly : 

“ Oh, I do hope you ’ll excuse my laughing, sir. 
The fact is that it was not I who tried to avoid 
seeing you. It was Smithfield’s idea.” 

“ Smithfield! ” cried Crane. 

“ Yes, sir. He had the notion, I think, that 
you might be very severe with me, sir, and Smith- 
field is peculiar, he has a very sensitive nature — ” 

“ Well, upon my word,” cried Crane, springing 
to his feet, “ that is exactly what Smithfield says 
about you. It seems to me I have a damned queer 
houseful of servants.” 


91 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


The cook edged to the door. 

“ Perhaps it seems so, sir,” she said. “ Will 
that be all for to-night? ” 

“ Yes. No,” he added hastily, “ I have one 
more thing to say to you, Jane-Ellen, and it ’s 
this. Don’t make the mistake of fancying that I 
have taken this whole incident lightly. I don’t. 
It really must not happen again. Understand that 
clearly.” 

“ You mean if that gentleman came back, you 
would dismiss me, sir? ” 

“ I think I would,” he answered. 

“ Even if it were n’t my fault? ” 

“ Was the fault entirely his, Jane-Ellen? ” 

“ Ask him, sir.” 

“ You know much more about it than he does. 
Was the fault entirely his? ” 

The cook wriggled her shoulders, crumpled her 
apron and seemed unwilling to answer a direct 
question directly. At last an idea occurred to her. 
She looked up brightly. 

“ It was the ice-cream, sir,” she said. “ I was 
trying to teach him how to freeze ice-cream slowly. 
It ought to be done like this.” And bending over 
92 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


an imaginary freezer, she imitated with her ab- 
surdly small hand the suave, gentle, rotary motion 
essential to the great American luxury. 

As he stood looking down on her, it seemed to 
Crane extraordinarily clear how it had all hap- 
pened, so clear indeed that for a second it almost 
seemed as if he himself were in the place of the 
culprit whose conduct he had just been condemn- 
ing. 

He stepped back hastily. 

“ No, Jane-Ellen,” he said, “ it was not all his 
fault. Of that you have convinced me.” 

She stretched out her hand to the door. 

“Will that be all, sir? The cook, you know, 
has to get up so very early in the morning.” 

He tried to counteract the feeling of pity and 
shame that swept over him at the realization that 
this young and delicate creature had to get up at 
dawn to work for him and his guests. The effort 
made his tone rather severe as he said : 

“ Yes, that ’s all. Good night.” 

“ Good night, sir,” she answered, with her un- 
ruffled sweetness, and was gone. 

He stood still a moment, conscious of an un- 

93 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

usual alertness both of mind and emotion. And 
that very alertness made him aware that at that 
moment there was a man in his kitchen against 
whom he felt the keenest personal animosity. 
Crane would have dearly liked to go down and 
turn him out, but he resisted the impulse, which 
somehow savored of Tucker in his mind. And 
what, by the way, had Tucker been doing in the 
kitchen? And Smithfield, why had Smithfield 
tried to interfere with his seeing the cook? He 
found plenty of food for reflection. 

Among other things he had to consider his 
return to the drawing-room. Looking at his 
watch he observed that a longer time had elapsed 
since he left it than he had supposed. There 
would be comments, there would be attempted 
jokes from Tucker. Well, that would be easily 
met by a question as to Tucker’s own interest in 
the culinary art. Mrs. Falkener’s methods of at- 
tack were not subtle, either. But Cora — he 
wished Cora would not just look at him as if he 
had done something cruel. 

But, as is so often the way when we prepare 
ourselves for one situation, quite another one turns 
94 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


up. The three were not sitting, awaiting his re- 
turn. The drawing-room was empty except for 
Mrs. Falkener, who was reading when he entered, 
and instead of betraying a conviction that he had 
been too long away, she looked up and said chat- 
tily : 

“ Well, did you reduce the young woman to or- 
der? ” 

“ That is a good deal to expect from an un- 
aided male, is n’t it? ” said Burton, very much re- 
lieved. 

“ Ah, it depends on the male, my dear Burton. 
You, I imagine, could be very terrifying if you 
wished to be. What did the young woman do? 
Weep, protest, declare that it had all taken place 
quite without her consent? ” 

Burton smiled. He had no intention whatso- 
ever of sharing his recent experiences with Mrs. 
Falkener. 

“ Ah,” he said, “ I see you know your own sex 
thoroughly. Where are Tuck and your daugh- 
ter? ” 

“ Solon is taking a turn on the piazza; he hopes 
it will make him sleep better; and Cora was tired 
95 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

and has gone to bed.” Mrs. Falkener sighed. 
“ Cora does n’t seem very well to me.” 

“ I ’m sorry to hear that,” returned Crane. “ I 
thought she was looking very fit this evening.” 
He spoke more lightly than he felt, however, for 
something portentous in Mrs. Falkener’s tone 
struck him with alarm. 

“ Sit down. Burton,” said she, sweeping her 
hand toward a cushioned stool at her side. “ I 
want to say something to you.” 

Crane found himself obeying, with his hands 
between his knees, and his toes turned in, like a 
school boy who has forgotten his lesson ; then, be- 
coming aware of this pose, he suddenly changed 
it — crossed one leg over the other, as he had 
done in the oflice a few minutes before. 

In the meantime, Mrs. Falkener was saying: 

“ The truth is, I ’m afraid that we must cut 
our visit short, delightful as it promises to be.” 

“ Oh, Mrs. Falkener, we ’re not making you 
comfortable. What is it?” 

“ No, Burton, no.” Mrs. Falkener held up 
her hand. “ You are making us perfectly com- 
fortable — at least, in all essentials. And who 
96 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


minds roughing it now and then for a week or so ? 
It ’s good for us,” she added playfully. “ The 
housemaid is not — but no matter.” 

“ What has the housemaid done? ” asked Crane 
with what semblance of Interest he could summon, 
but as he spoke his heart went out in sympathy 
to every hotel and boarding-house keeper in the 
world. “ Good heavens,” he thought, “ suppose 
my living depended on my pleasing them, what a 
state I should be in! ” Aloud he said: “ What 
has Lily been doing? ” 

” Nothing, nothing. Lily means well, I ’m 
sure, in spite of her lackadaisical ways. It is quite 
a privilege, I assure you, to be waited on by such 
an elegant young lady. She hooked me up wrong 
twice this evening, and when I not unnaturally ob- 
jected, she stuck a pin In me. Oh, by accident, 
I ’m sure. No, I have no fault to find with Lily, 
whatsoever.” 

“ I ’m glad to hear that,” said Crane, punctu- 
ating his sentence to allow himself to indulge in a 
half-suppressed yawn. “Who is it, then? Not 
Smithfield ? Or the boy ? ” 

“ Oh, I should never have anything to do with 

97 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


that boy,” said Mrs. Falkener, bridling. “ Oh, 
never in the world. I think he ’s half-witted. 1 
saw him stick out his tongue at Solon this eve- 
ning.” 

Crane laughed, though he knew he ought not 
to. 

“Did Solon see?” 

“ No. The boy contrived it so that Solon had 
just looked away.” 

“ Well, then, perhaps he ’s not half-witted, after 
all,” said Burton. “ It occurs to me that perhaps 
that is the only reply to a good deal that Solon 
says.” 

“ I ’m devoted to Solon,” replied Mrs. Falk- 
ener, drawing herself up, “ and I must say you 
ought to — ” 

“ I am, I am,” said Crane, hastily, “ but I am at 
the same time able to understand why Brindlebury 
possibly is n’t. But come, Mrs. Falkener, if it 
is n’t these servants that are driving you away, 
what is it? ” 

“ I don’t know how to explain it,” said Mrs. 
Falkener. “ It ’s not really clear to me, myself. 
I ’m sure I don’t want to be unkind, or to hurt any 


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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


one’s feelings, least of all yours, my dear Burt.” 
And she leaned over and laid her hand on his. 
Crane gave it a good brisk squeeze and returned it 
to her lap as if it were too dear for his possessing; 
and she went on : “I own I am anxious about 
Cora. She is very deep, very reserved; she tells 
me nothing, but she is not happy. Burton.” 

“ I ’m sorry for that,” said Crane, in a very 
matter-of-fact tone. He got up and went to a 
table where the cigarettes were. The profound 
male instinct of self-preservation was now thor- 
oughly awake, and he knew exactly what he was 
in for. Only, he noted, that if he had had this in- 
terview with Mrs. Falkener before he had seen 
the cook, he might quite easily have been per- 
suaded that, in the absence of any more definite 
vocation, he had been created to make Cora Falk- 
ener’s life tolerable to her. As it was, he saw 
perfectly that altruism was no sound basis for 
matrimony. 

“ You don’t understand what it is to be a 
mother, Burt.” 

Crane admitted with a shake of his head that he 
did n’t. 

lOI 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

“ But I have an instinct that this is not the best 
place for Cora.” 

“ Well, if you were a man, Mrs. Falkener,” 
said Crane, “ I should say that that instinct was 
the result of being poorly valeted. It must be a 
bore for women to have a wretched maid like Lily. 
Don’t you think that if I found some one a little 
more competent that you and Cora would feel you 
could put in at least a week or so with us? The 
hunting is really going to be good, and Cora does 
enjoy hunting.” 

Mrs. Falkener refused to lighten the tone of the 
conversation. She shook her head. 

“ No,” she said, ” no. I ’m afraid even a good 
maid would not help. In fact, to speak plainly, 
my dear Burton — ” 

But at this moment the door opened and Tucker 
came in. His hair was somewhat rumpled by the 
wind, his hands were still in his pockets as he had 
had them during his constitutional on the front 
porch, and his eyes, contracted by the sudden light, 
looked almost white. 

“ Well,” he said, “ are you enjoying this musical 
party downstairs ? ” 


102 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


All three listened in silence, and could hear the 
strains of “ Home, Sweet Home ” coming from 
below. 

“ They have a phonograph and they are sing- 
ing in parts,” said Tucker, as if this somehow made 
it worse. 

‘‘ If we got Miss Falkener down, we might do 
something ourselves,” said Crane, but there was 
nothing frivolous in his manner when he rang and 
told Smithfield there was too much noise down- 
stairs. 

Smithfield begged pardon and had not a notion 
it could be heard upstairs. Crane said the boy’s, 
Brindlebury’s, tenor carried some distance, and, 
Mrs. Falkener and Tucker having gone, he added 
that the house could be shut for the night. 

Then he went to the table, and his eye fell again 
upon the miniature in the pearl frame. He took 
it up. There was no doubt about it, there was an 
extraordinary likeness to Jane-Ellen. He smiled 
to himself. How very charming she would look, 
he thought, in a mauve ball dress. 

Raising his eyes, he found Smithfield looking at 
him with an expression he did not thoroughly like. 

103 


VI 


O N the stroke of seven o’clock the next morn- 
ing, Burton came downstairs with that ex- 
actness which even the most careless man can dis- 
play in regard to his favorite sport. The rigors 
of the cub-hunting season being over, the meet 
did not take place until eight. 

Cora was not yet ready for breakfast, and Crane 
went to fill his cigarette case before starting. 

The drawing-room was still dark and in dis- 
order. Crane lit a match to find his way to the 
table where the tobacco was kept. It was the 
same table on which had lain the miniature of the 
lady in the mauve ball dress ; and as he held up his 
lighted match, his eyes sought once more that en- 
chanting pearl circle. The flame died down and 
burned his fingers before his eyes had encountered 
what they were looking for. He lit a second 
match, and then a candle, before he could assure 
himself that the miniature was really gone. 

He sprang into the hall and called : “ Smith- 

104 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


field! ” with a violence that had little respect for 
late sleepers. 

Smithfield came hurrying out of the dining- 
room. 

“ Where ’s the miniature that used to be on this 
table?” 

“ The what is it, sir? ” 

“ The miniature, a picture in a pearl frame.” 

Smithfield looked thoughtful. 

“ And what was it a picture of, sir? ” 

“ Of a lady.” 

“ In a black lace cap, and she with white hair, 
sir?” 

“ No,” said Crane, “ she was young and lovely, 
in a ball dress and a wreath. You must remember' 
it. It was here yesterday.” 

Smithfield shook his head blankly. 

“ No, sir,” he said, “ I can’t rightly say that I 
remember it, but I ’ll inquire for it.” 

Crane swore with an uncontrollable irritation 
— irritation at Smithfield for being so stupid, irri- 
tation that he himself had been so careless as to 
leave the picture about among a houseful of un- 
known servants. 

105 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


He was not distracted even by the sight of Cora 
coming downstairs, looking very workmanlike in 
her habit with her hat well down over her brows, 
and her boots, over which Brindlebury had evi- 
dently expended himself, showing off her slender 
feet. 

They breakfasted alone; but Burton’s mind ran 
on the loss of the miniature, and he did not really 
recover his temper until he had mounted Cora, 
found all the straps of her skirt, adjusted her 
stirrup, loosened the curb for her, and finally 
swung himself up on his own hunter, a big ugly 
chestnut. 

The meet was near-by and they were going to 
jog quietly over to It. They took a short cut 
across the lawn, and at the sight of the turf, at the 
smell of the fresh clear morning, the horses began 
to dance as spontaneously as children will at the 
sound of a street organ. Crane and Cora glanced 
at each other and laughed at this exhibition of high 
spirits on the part of their darlings. 

No horseman is proof against the pleasure of 
seeing one of his treasured animals well shown by 
its rider; and the Irish mare had never looked as 
io6 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


well as she now did under Cora’s skilful manage- 
ment. He told her so, praising her hands, her 
appearance, her understanding of the horse’s 
mind; and she, very fittingly, replied with flattery 
of the mare and of Crane’s own remarkable 
powers of selection. 

They were getting on so well that Burton found 
himself saying earnestly: 

“ You really must stay on as long as I do, Cora. 
Don’t let your mother take you away, as she wants 
to.” 

The girl’s surprise actually checked the mare in 
her stride. 

“ My mother is thinking of going away? ” she 
cried. 

Well, of course, he wanted her to stay, wanted 
her, even, to want to stay, but somehow he did 
not want her to be so much terrified at the thought 
of departure, did not want her blac|c eyes to open 
upon him with such manifest horro.r at the bare 
idea of departure. 

He suggested sending the horses along a little, 
and they cantered side by side on the grass at the 
roadside. Crane kept casting the glances of a 
1 07, 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

lover, not at Cora, but at the black mare, as she 
arched her neck to a light touch on the curb, so 
that the sunlight ran in iridescent colors along her 
crest. 

Presently they saw two horsemen ahead of 
them, one of them in that weather-stained pink 
that, to hunting eyes, makes the most beautiful 
piece of color imaginable against the autumn fields. 

“ That ’s Eliot, the Master,” cried Crane. 
“ The hounds must be just ahead. He ’s a nice 
old fellow; let ’s join him. I can’t make out who 
the other one is — no one who was out the last 
time we hunted.” 

The canter had given Cora a color. She looked 
straight before her for a moment, and then she 
said: 

“ I think I recognize that other man.” 

“Who is it?” 

“ Some one I should like you to know, Burt. 
His name is Lefferts.” 

The lane was now too narrow for four to ride 
abreast. Crane drew Eliot to his side. He 
wanted to ask him about the Crosslett-BIllingtons, 
for since the disappearance of the miniature, he 
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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


had made up his mind to investigate the references 
of his staff. But strange to say, Eliot had never 
heard of the Billingtons, of their collection of 
tapestry, or their villa at Capri. He wished to 
talk of the Revellys. 

“ A great loss they are to the county. Crane, 
though, of course, we gain you. I wonder where 
they are. Gone North, I heard, though I thought 
I saw one of the boys out the morning of the day 
you came. The Revellys will hunt anything, from 
a plow-horse to a thoroughbred. Hard up, you 
know. Glad they consented to rent their house. 
Didn’t suppose they ever would. Too proud, 
you know. They have things in it of immense 
value. Portrait of the grandfather, Marshall 
Revelly. Second in command to Stonewall 
Jackson at one time. I ’d like to have you know 
them. Paul, the elder brother, is a man of some 
ability; may make his mark. And the younger 
daughter. Miss Claudia Revelly — ” Do what 
he would, Eliot’s voice changed slightly in pro- 
nouncing the name. “ — Miss Claudia is one of 
our great beauties, the recipient of a great deal of 
attention. Why, sir, last summer, when Daniel 
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W. Williams, the Governor-elect of this State, 
saw Miss Claudia at — ” 

But the story, in which, to be candid. Crane did 
not take a great deal of interest, was interrupted 
by Cora who pushed her mare forward in order to 
attract Crane’s attention and to introduce him to 
her companion. 

The young man was extraordinarily good-look- 
ing. His eyes were a strange greenish-brown 
color, like the water In the dock of a city ferry ; his 
skin was ivory In hue and as smooth as a woman’s, 
but his hands and a certain decisiveness of gesture 
were virile In the extreme. 

“ We ought to have a good run,” said Crane, in 
order to say something. 

“ If any run can be good,” answered the young 
man. 

“ You don’t like hunting? ” 

“ I hate anything to do with horses,” answered 
Lefferts, plaintively. “ You must admit they 
are particularly unintelligent animals. If they 
were n’t, of course they would n’t let u's buUy 
them and ride them about, when they could do any- 
thing they wanted with us. No, I only do it be- 


IIO 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


cause she,” he nodded toward Miss Falkener, 
“ makes me.” 

Cora, looking very handsome, laughed. 

“ He ’s a poet,” she said. 

“ Is that why he has to hunt? ” asked Crane, 
and he wondered if poetry had anything to do with 
the excellence of the young man’s coat and boots. 

“ Yes, poets have to be athletic nowadays. 
It ’s the fashion, and a very good one, too.” 

“ There are other forms of athletics I don’t hate 
nearly as much,” Lefferts went on to Crane, 
“ swimming, for instance, and sailing, and even 
walking is n’t so bad. It does n’t need so much 
preparation, and getting up early in the morning, 
and all that sort of thing.” 

“ Fortunately, I know what ’s best for him,” 
said Cora. 

“ She makes me think she does,” said the poet, 
still plaintively. 

Crane wanted to ask Cora where and how she 
had acquired this rather agreeable responsibility, 
but he had no opportunity before they were off. 

He and Cora started together, less, perhaps, 
from chivalry on Burton’s part than because of his 


III 


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desire to watch the performance of the mare, but 
in the course of the run they became separated, and 
he finally jogged home alone. 

He dismounted in the stable-yard and stood 
watching one of the grooms loosening the saddle- 
girths, while he and the head man discussed the ex- 
cellent conduct of his own horses as compared 
with the really pitiable showing of other people’s, 
and debated whether the wretched deterioration In 
a certain Canadian bay horse ridden that day by 
the Master of Hounds was owing to naturally 
poor conformation on the part of the horse, or 
deplorable lack of judgment on the part of the 
rider. 

In the midst of these absorbing topics. Crane 
suddenly became aware that Smithfield was wait- 
ing for him at the gateway. He stopped short In 
what he was saying. 

“ You wanted to speak to me, Smithfield? ” 

“ When you ’ve finished, sir.” 

Crane had finished, he said, and turned in the 
direction of the house with the butler at his side. 

“ There ’s been a terrible disturbance at the 
house, sir, since you went out this morning.” 


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“ Oh, my powers ! ” cried Burton. “ What has 
been happening now? ” 

Smithfield was stepping along, throwing out 
his feet and resting on the ball of his foot with 
the walk that Mrs. Falkener had so much ad- 
mired. 

“ Well, sir,” he said, “ the trouble has been be- 
tween Mr. Tucker and Brindlebury.” 

Crane groaned. 

“ I don’t defend the boy, sir. I fear he forgot 
his place.” 

“ Look here, Smithfield,” said Crane, “ can- 
didly, now, what is the matter with all of you? 
You know you really are a very queer lot.” 

Thus appealed to, Smithfield considered. 

“ Well, sir,” he said, “ I think the trouble — 
as much as any one thing is the trouble — is that 
we ’re young, and servants ought n’t to be young. 
They should be strong, healthy, hard working, but 
not young; for youth means impulses, hopes of im- 
provement, love of enjoyment, all qualities serv- 
ants must not have.” The man spoke entirely 
without bitterness, and Crane turning to him said 
suddenly: 

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“ Smithfield, what do you think about class dis- 
tinctions? ” 

For the first time, Smithfield smiled. 

“ I think, sir,” he said, “ that if they were done 
away with, I should lose my job.” 

“ Well, by heaven, if I were you, then,” cried 
Crane, with unusual feeling, “ I ’d get a job that 
was n’t dependent on a lie, for if I believe any- 
thing it is that all these dissimilarities between rich 
and poor, and men and women, and black and 
white, are pretty trivial as compared with their 
similarities. It ’s my opinion we are all very 
much alike, Smithfield,” and Crane, as he spoke, 
was astonished at the passion for democracy that 
stirred within him. 

“ That, sir,” replied Smithfield, “ if you forgive 
my saying it, is the attitude toward democracy of 
some one who has always been at the top. There 
must be distinctions, must n’t there, sir, and you 
would probably say that the ideal distinction was 
along the line of merit — that every one should 
have the place in the world that he deserves. But, 
dear me, sir, that would be very cruel. So many 
of us would then be face to face with our own in- 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


feriority. Now, as things are, I can think that 
it ’s only outside conditions that are keeping me 
down, and that I should make as good or even bet- 
ter a master, begging your pardon, than you, sir. 
But under a true democracy, if I were still in an in- 
ferior position, I should have to admit I belonged 
there, which I don’t admit at all now, not at 
all.” 

“ But how about my not admitting that I ’m a 
master? ” said Crane. 

“ In one sense, perhaps you are not, sir,” an- 
swered Smithfield. “ For, after all, some training 
is necessary to be a servant, particularly a butler, 
but for the exercise of the functions of the higher 
classes, no training at all seems to be required. 
Curious, isn’t it, sir? Utterly unskilled labor is 
found only among the very rich and the very 
poor.” 

The conversation had brought them to the 
house, without the case of Brindlebury having been 
further discussed. Suddenly realizing this. Crane 
stopped at the foot of the steps. 

“ Now, what is it that ’s happened? ” he asked. 

Smithfield showed some embarrassment. 

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“ I ’m afraid, sir,” he said, “ that some rather 
hot words passed. In fact — I do so much regret 
it, sir, but I fear Brindlebury actually raised his 
hand against Mr. Tucker.” 

It was a triumph of s:elf-control that not a 
muscle of Burton’s face quivered at this intelli- 
gence. 

“ If that is true,” he said, “ the boy will have to 
go, of course.” 

“ I had hoped you might wish to hear both 
sides, sir.” 

“ No,” answered Crane. “ I might hear what 
Brindlebury had to say, or I might understand 
without hearing, or I might know that I should 
have done the same in his place, or, even, going a 
step farther, I might think him right to have done 
it, but the fact remains that I can’t keep a servant 
who strikes a guest of mine. That ’s a class dis- 
tinction, Smithfield, but there it is.” 

Smithfield bowed. 

“ If I might suggest, sir, perhaps you do not 
understand rightly how Mr. Tucker — ” 

“ Nothing like that, Smithfield. Tell the boy 
to go, go this afternoon. Pay him what ’s right 
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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


and get him out.” He ran up the steps, but turned 
half-way and added with a smile: “And you 
know there really is n’t anything you could tell me 
about Mr. Tucker that I have n’t known a great 
deal longer than any of you have.” 

He went in. Tucker and Mrs. Falkener were 
sitting side by side in the drawing-room, with that 
unmistakable air of people who expect, and have a 
right to expect, that they should be given an op- 
portunity to tell their troubles. The only revenge 
that Crane permitted himself, if indeed revenge 
can be used to describe so mild a, punishment, was 
that he continued to ignore their perfectly obvious 
grumpiness. 

“ Well,” he said, “ you look cozy. Hope 
you ’ve had as good a day as we have.” 

Tucker opened his mouth to say “ We have 
not,” but Crane was already in full description of 
the run, undaunted by the fact that neither of his 
listeners, if they were indeed listeners, could be 
induced to manifest enough interest in his story to 
meet his eye. 

“ I ’m glad some one has enjoyed the day,” said 
Tucker, as Crane paused to light a cigarette. He 
1 17 


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laid an unmistakable emphasis on the words “ some 
one.” 

Crane patted him on the shoulder. 

“Thanks, Tuck,” he said; “ I believe that’s 
true. I believe you are glad. Yes, we had a 
good day — three foxes, and your daughter, Mrs. 
Falkener, went like a bird. She ’s a wonderful 
horsewoman — not only looks well herself, but 
makes the horse look well, too.” 

At this Mrs. Falkener’s manner grew distinctly 
more cheerful, and she asked: 

“ And, by the way, where is Cora? ” 

Tucker, annoyed at the desertion on the part of 
his ally, pressed his hand over his eyes and sighed 
audibly, but no one noticed him. 

“ I took a wrong turn in search of a short 
cut and lost the rest of them,” said Crane. 
“ But she ’ll be back directly. She ’s perfectly 
safe. She was with Eliot, our neighbor, and 
a fellow named Lefferts, whom she seemed to 
know.” 

“Lefferts!” cried Mrs. Falkener. “That 
man here! O Burton, how could you leave 
my daughter in such company? O Solon, 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


you remember I told you about that man I ” 

Tucker nodded shortly. He was n’t going to 
take any interest in any one’s grievances until his 
own had been disposed of. 

“What’s the matter with Lefierts?’’ said 
Crane. “ He ’s staying with Eliot, and they 
asked us all over to lunch to-morrow. Shan’t we 
go?” 

“ No, nowhere that that young man is,” cried 
Mrs. Falkener, who seemed to be a good deal ex- 
cited by the news. “ He ’s an idler, a waster. 
Why, Burton,” she ended in a magnificent climax, 
“ he ’s a poet! ” 

“ So Cora told me.” 

“ He affects to be devoted to Cora,” her mother 
went on bitterly, “ and follows her about every- 
where, without the slightest encouragement on her 
part, I can assure you, but I have known him to 
take a most insolent tone about her. The very 
first time I ever saw him, he was sitting beside me 
at a party, and I said, as Cora came across the 
room with that magnificent walk of hers, ‘ She 
moves like a full-rigged ship, does n’t she ? ’ He 
answered: ‘Or rather, more like a submarine; 

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you never know where she ’ll pop up next. Yes, 
there ’s a sort of practical mystery about Cora 
very suitable to modern warfare.’ He called her 
Cora behind her back, but not to her face, be sure. 
And very soon a poem of his appeared in one 
of the magazines — ‘ To My Love, Comparing 
Her to a Submarine.’ I thought it most insult- 
ing.” 

“ And what did Cora think? ” asked Crane. 

“ SEe hardly read the thing through. Cora is 
far too sensible to pay much attention to po- 
etry.” 

“ But poets are different, I suppose,” answered 
Crane. Personally, he was pleased with the sub- 
marine simile. 

“ No, nor poets, either,” said Mrs. Falkenec 
tartly, and rising she hurried away to see if by 
some fortunate chance her errant daughter had 
returned without letting her know. 

Left alone. Crane decided to give his friend his 
long-desired chance. 

“ Well, Tuck,” he said, “ you look in fine 
form. What have you been doing since I went 
away ? ” 


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“ I have not had a very agreeable day,” said 
Tucker, in a voice so low and deep that it was al- 
most a growl. 

“No? Not a return of your old dyspepsia, 
I hope,” said Crane. 

Tucker shook his head impatiently. 

“ At breakfast,” he said, “ I heard from Mrs. 
Falkener, who had heard from her daughter, that 
you had observed the loss of the miniature that 
used to lie on this table. Such things cannot be 
taken lightly. Burton. The owners might put al- 
most any price on an article of that kind — 
wretched as it was, as a work of art — and you 
would be forced to pay. You see, it could not be 
replaced. I thought it my duty, therefore, to 
send for each of the servants and question them on 
the subject.” 

“You thought it your duty to send for Jane- 
Ellen, Tuck?” 

Again Tucker frowned. 

“ I said I sent for all of the servants. Smith- 
field displayed, to my mind, a most suspicious igno- 
rance and indifference to the whole subject. The 
housemaid was so hysterical and frightened that if 


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I did not know a great deal of such cases, I should 
suspect her — ” 

“And was the cook frightened?” said Crane, 
with a flicker of a smile. 

“ No,” Tucker explained, “ she did not appear 
to be frightened, but then, I may tell you that I 
do not suspect the cook of complicity in the theft.” 

“The deuce you don’t!” said Crane. He 
found himself suddenly annoyed without reason, 
that Tucker should have been interviewing and 
questioning his servants during his absence; stir-, 
ring up trouble, he said to himself, and perhaps 
hurting the feelings of a perfectly good cook. 
Suppose she had decided to leave as a result of 
these activities of Solon’s ! He found he had 
not been listening to the account his friend was 
giving of the conversation, until he heard him 
say: 

“ It seems Jane-Ellen had never been in this 
room before; she was very much interested in 
everything. I saw her looking at that splendid 
portrait of General Revelly, and she asked — in 
fact, she made me give her quite a little account 
of his life—” 


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“ A little lecture on the Civil War, eh? ” said 
Crane. 

His tone was not wholly friendly and Tucker 
did not find it so. He colored. 

“ Really, Burton,” he said, coldly, “ in case of 
crime, or of theft, a man’s lawyer is usually sup- 
posed to know what it is best to do.” 

“ Possibly, but I see no point in having dragged 
the cook into it.” 

“ I see even less point in treating her on a dif- 
ferent plane from any of the other servants.” 

“ It almost seems. Tuck, as if you enjoyed your 
constant interviews with her.” 

“ That is just, I regret to say. Burton, what 
I was thinking about you.” 

“ It seems to me,” said Crane, “ that this dis- 
cussion is not leading anywhere, and might as well 
end.” 

“ One moment,” exclaimed the other, “ my 
story is not finished. When it came to be the turn 
of that boy Brindlebury, in whom I may as well 
tell you I have no confidence whatever, his manner 
was so insolent, his refusal to answer my ques- 
tions so suspicious — Well, to make a long story 
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short, your boot-boy, Burton, attempted to knock 
me down, and I had, of course, to put him out of 
the room. The situation is perfectly simple. I 
must ask you either to dismiss him, or to order 
the motor to take me to the train.” 

There was a short pause, during which Crane 
very deliberately lit a cigarette. Then he said in 
a level tone : 

“ The boy is already dismissed. He is out of 
the house at this moment, probably. As to the 
other alternative — the ordering the motor — I 
will, of course, do that, too, if you insist.” 

But Tucker did not insist. 

“ On the contrary,” he said, “ you have done 
all I could desire — more, indeed, for you have 
evidently decided against the boy before you even 
heard my side of the case.” 

“ One cannot always decide these cases with 
regard for eternal justice,” said Crane. 

Before Tucker could inquire just what was 
meant by this rather disagreeable pronounce- 
ment, Smithfield appeared in the doorway to say 
that Jane-Ellen would be glad if she might speak 
to Mr. Crane for a moment. 


124 


I * 



Jane-Ellen 


« 








% 


‘1 







4 


t 



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This was what Crane had dreaded; she was 
going to leave. His anger against Tucker flared 
up again, but he said, with apparent calmness, 
that Jane-Ellen might come in. Tucker should 
see for himself the effect of his meddling. Tucker 
suggested in a sort of half-hearted way that he 
would go away, but his host told him, shortly, to 
remain. 

Jane-Ellen entered. There was no doubt but 
that she was displeased with the presence of a 
third party. She made a little bob of a curtsy and 
started for the door. 

“ I ’ll come back when you ’re alone, sir.” 

“ No,” said Crane. “ Anything you have to 
say can be said before Mr. Tucker.” 

“ Oh, of course, sir.” But her tone lacked con- 
viction. “ I wanted to speak about Brindlebury. 
He is very sorry for what happened, sir. I wish 
you could see your way — ” 

“ I can’t,” said Crane. 

Jane-Ellen glanced at Tucker under her eye- 
lashes. 

“ I know, sir,” she went on, “ that there could 
be no excuse for the way he has acted, but if any 
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excuse was possible, it did seem — ” She hesi- 
tated. 

“ You wish to say,” interrupted Burton who 
now felt he did not care what he said to any one, 
“ that Mr. Tucker was extremely provoking. I 
have no doubt, but that has nothing to do with 
it.” 

“ Really, Burton,” observed his guest, “ I don’t 
think that that is the way to speak of me, 
particularly,” he added firmly, “ to a ser- 
vant.” 

“ It ’s sometimes a good idea to speak the truth, 
even to servants, Solon,” returned Crane. “ You 
are provoking, and no one knows it better than I 
have known it during the past fifteen minutes. 
But your powers of being provoking have noth- 
ing to do with the matter, except theoretically. 
The boy has got to go. I want him to be out of 
the house within an hour. That ’s all there is to 
the whole question, Jane-Ellen.” 

“ But, oh, sir, if he is sorry — ” 

“ I doubt very much if he is sorry.” 

“ Oh, why, sir? ” 

'* Because I feel sure that in his place I 
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should n’t be sorry in the least, except for having 
failed — if he did fail.” 

“ I know it ’s a great liberty, sir, but I do wish 
you could give him another chance.” Her look 
was extraordinarily appealing. 

“ What in the world is Brindlebury to you, 
Jane-Ellen?” 

“ Did n’t Mr. Tucker tell you, sir? He ’s my 
brother.” 

“No, he did n’t tell me. Did you know he was 
Jane-Ellen’s brother, Solon?” 

“ Brin told him, himself, sir.” She was a lit- 
tle overeager. 

Tucker frowned. 

“ Yes, I believe the boy did say something to 
that effect. I own I was not much interested in 
the fact, and I can’t say I think it has any bearing 
on the present situation.” 

Crane was silent for an instant. Then he said : 

“ No, it has n’t. He ’s got to go,” and then he 
added, quite clearly, and looking at his cook very 
directly : 

“ But I am sorry, Jane-Ellen, not to be able to 
do anything that you ask me to do.” 

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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

She looked back at him for an instant, with a 
sort of imperishable sweetness, and then went 
sadly out of the room. 

Between Crane and his legal adviser no further 
words were exchanged. 

Crane went and took out one of the motors 
and rushed at a high rate of speed over the coun- 
try, frightening one or two sedate black mules, 
the only other travelers on the roads, and sooth- 
ing his own irritation by the rapidity of the mo- 
tion. 

More and more he regretted not having been 
able to grant the favor Jane-Ellen had so engag- 
ingly asked, more and more he felt inclined to be- 
lieve that in Brindlebury’s place he would have 
done the same thing, more and more did he feel 
disposed to fasten upon Tucker all the disagree- 
ableness of the situation. 


130 


VII 


H e did not get back until almost dinner time. 

The meal was not an agreeable one, though 
Jane-Ellen’s part of the performance was no less 
perfectly achieved than usual. It was evident 
that there had been a scene between the two ladies. 
Cora’s eyes were distinctly red, and though Mrs. 
Falkener’s bore no such evidence, she looked more 
haggard than was her wont. Tucker was still 
feeling somewhat Imposed upon, Smithfield’s man- 
ner suggested a dignified rebuke. Crane felt no In- 
clination to lighten the general tone, and alto- 
gether the occasion was dreary in the extreme. 

As soon as they had had coffee, Cora sat down 
at the piano, and drawing Burton to her by a re- 
quest for more light, she whispered : 

“Won’t you take me out in the garden? I 
have something I must say to you.” 

Crane acquiesced. It was a splendid, misty 
November night. The moonlight was of that 

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sea-green color which, so often represented on 
the stage, is seldom seen in nature. The moon 
concealed the bareness of the garden-beds, lent a 
suggestion of mystery to the thickets of what had 
once been flowering shrubs, and made the columns 
of the piazza, which in the daytime showed them- 
selves most plainly to be but ill-painted wood, ap- 
pear almost like the marble portico of an Ionic 
temple. 

The air was so still that from the stables, al- 
most a quarter of a mile away, they could hear 
the sound of one of the horses kicking in its stall, 
and the tune that a groom was rather unskilfully 
deducing from a concertina. 

Crane whistled the air softly as he strolled 
along by his companion’s side, until she stopped 
and said with great intensity: 

“ I want to say something to you. Burton. 
I ’m not happy. I ’m horribly distressed. I 
ought not to say what I ’m going to say, at least 
the general idea seems to be that girls should n’t 
— but I have a feeling that you ’re really my 
friend, a friend to whom I can speak frankly even 
about things that concern me.” 

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“ You make no mistake there, Cora,” he re- 
turned. 

He was what is considered a brave man, with 
calm nerves and quick judgment; physical danger 
had a certain stimulating effect upon him ; morally, 
too, he did not lack courage; though good-na- 
turedly inclined to have everything as pleasant as 
possible, he was not in the least afraid to make 
himself disagreeable. But now, at the thought 
of what Miss Falkener was going to say to him, 
he was frankly and unmistakably terrified. Why, 
he asked himself? Young and timid girls could 
go through such scenes and, it was said, actually 
enjoy them. Why should he be unreasoningly 
terrified — terrified with the same instinctive de- 
sire to run away that some people feel when they 
see snakes or spiders? Why should he feel as if 
prison walls were closing about him ? 

“ Two years ago, when you and I first began to 
see each other,” Miss Falkener went on, in a 
voice that she kept dropping lower and lower in 
order to conceal its tremors, “ I liked you at once. 
Burton. I liked you very much. But, aside 
from that — you know, I ’m not always very 

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happy with my mother, aside from liking you, 
I made up mind in the most cold-blooded, 
mercenary way, that the best thing I could do was 
to marry you.” 

“ Well, I call that a thoroughly kind thought,” 
said Crane, smiling at her, as a martyr might make 
a little joke about the lions. 

“ It was n’t kind,” said Cora. “ It was just 
selfish. I supposed I would be able to make you 
happy, but really, I thought very little about you 
in the matter. I was thinking only of myself. 
But I ’ve been well repaid for it — ” She 
stopped, almost with a sob ; and while she was si- 
lently struggling for sufficient self-control to con- 
tinue, Crane became aware that the front door 
had opened, letting a sudden shaft of yellow light 
fall upon them through the green moonshine, and 
that Tucker had come out on the piazza. He 
was looking about; he was looking for them. 
Not a sound did Burton make, but if concentration 
of thought has any unseen power, he drew Tuck- 
er’s gaze to them. 

“ Burton,” said Tucker. 

There was no answer. 

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COME OOT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


“ Burton ! ” he called again. 

Miss Falkener raised her head. 

“ Some one called you,” she said. 

Then Crane’s figure became less rigid, and he 
moved a step forward. He was saved for the 
time, at least. 

“ Want me. Tuck? ” he said. 

Solon came down the steps carefully. He had 
reached an age when the eye does not quickly ad- 
just itself to changes of light. 

“ Yes,” he said, “ I do want to see you. I 
want to ask you one question. Did you or did 
you not assure me the boy Brindlebury had left 
the house? ” 

“ I did so assure you,” answered Crane, “ and 
I had been so foolish as to hope we had 
heard the last of him. Smithfield told me be- 
fore dinner that he left early in the after- 
noon.” 

“ Smithfield lied to you. The boy is in bed 
in his own room at this moment.” 

“ How do you know? ” 

“ Go and see for yourself.” 

Crane was just angry enough at every one to 

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welcome any action. Only a few seconds elapsed 
before he was in the servants’ wing of the house. 
All the doors were standing open, disclosing black 
darkness, except one which was closed, and under 
this a bright streak was visible. 

Crane flung himself upon this, thinking it would 
be locked, but evidently Brindlebury had not 
thought any such precaution necessary. The 
door at once yielded, and Crane entered. 

Brindlebury, fully dressed, was lying flat on his 
back on the bed, with his legs crossed in the air; 
a cigarette was in his mouth (one of Burton’s 
cigarettes) , a reading-lamp was at his elbow, and 
he was engaged in the perusal of a new novel 
which Crane had received the day before, and 
had strangely missed ever since. On the floor 
near-by was a tray, empty indeed, but bearing un- 
mistakable signs of having been well filled only 
recently. 

Crane took the cigarette from Brindlebury’s 
mouth, and the book from his hand. 

“ Now,” he said, “ I ’ll give you five minutes 
to get your things together and get out.” There 
were no signs that packing had ever been con- 
136 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


templated; all Brindlebury’s belongings were un- 
disturbed. 

The boy looked at Crane. He would like to 
have answered, but he could not think of any- 
thing to say, so he got up slowly and tried to 
smooth his hair which was very much rumpled. 

“I’m not positive I have such a thing as a bag,” 
he observed at length, but a little search revealed 
one in the closet. It was marked “ B. Rev- 
elly.” 

“ A token of respect from your late employer, 
I suppose,” said Crane. 

The boy did not answer. He was rather 
sulkily putting on his clothes. He was not a neat 
packer. A tooth-brush and some pipe tobacco, a 
wet sponge and some clean shirts, boots and 
pajamas were indiscriminately mixed. 

The five minutes, unmarked by any conversa- 
tion, had almost elapsed when light steps were 
heard in the hallway, and a voice exclaimed: 

“ Did you have a good dinner, honey? ” and 
Jane-Ellen came spinning into the room, all the 
demureness gone from her manner. 

At the sight of her employer, she stopped, and 

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her hand went up to her mouth with a gesture ex- 
pressive of the utmost horror. Brindlebury did 
not stop packing. He was now filling in the cor- 
ners with shaving soap and socks. 

His sister turned to Crane. 

“ Oh, sir,” she wailed, “ we Ve acted very 
wrongly.” 

“ Jane-EUen,” replied Crane, “ that really 
does n’t go. It was a good manner, and you 
worked it well, but it is now, if you will forgive 
my saying so, old stuff. I cannot look upon you 
as a foolishly fond sister, frying to protect an 
erring brother. I think it far more likely that 
you are the organizer of this efficient little plan to 
keep him here unobserved, eating my food, read- 
ing my books, and smoking, if I am not greatly 
mistaken, my cigarettes. 

“ Oh, Brin, do you take Mr. Crane’s ciga- 
rettes?” said Jane-Ellen. 

“ Not unless I ’m out of my own,” said her 
brother. 

“ Without clearing his own honesty, he im- 
pugns my taste,” said Crane. 

It was plain that Jane-Ellen was going to make 

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another effort to improve the situation. She was 
thinking hard. At last she began ; 

“ I don’t defend what we ’ve done, sir, but if 
you would have let me see you alone this after- 
noon, I was going to ask that Brindlebury might 
stay just for this one night. Only I could n’t 
speak before Mr. Tucker, I ’m so afraid of him.” 

“ There you go again,” said Burton. “ You ’re 
not telling the truth. You ’re not in the least 
afraid of Tucker.” 

“ Well, not as much as I am of you, sir.” 

“ Jane-Ellen,” said Crane, “ I believe you are a 
very naughty girl.” He was surprised to find 
that every trace of ill temper had left him. 

“ I know what you mean, sir,” said the cook, 
and this time her voice had a certain common- 
place tone. “ And it ’s true. I have n’t always 
been perfectly honest with you, but a servant can’t 
be candid and open, sir; you know, yourself, it 
would n’t do.” 

“ I ’d like to see it tried,” returned Crane. 

“ Well, I ’m honest now, sir,” she went on, 
“ in asking you to let Brin stay. He ’ll apolo- 
gize, I ’m sure — ” 


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“ I will not,” said the boy, still packing. 

But his sister hardly noticed the interruption. 

“ He will do what I tell him when he comes to 
think it over, if you will only relent. Don’t you 
think you are just a little hard on him? He is 
my brother, and it would make me so happy if you 
would let him stay.” 

The desire to make others happy is not a crime, 
yet Crane felt nothing but shame at the obvious 
weakening of his own resolution under the pecul- 
iarly melting voice of Jane-Ellen. He glanced at. 
the boy, he thought of Tucker, he looked long at 
Jane-Ellen. Who knows what might have hap- 
pened if his eyes, which he decided he must wrench 
away from hers, had not suddenly fallen upon a 
small object lying undisguised on Brindlebury’s 
dressing-table. 

It was the pearl set miniature. 

All three saw it almost at the same instant. 
The hands of all went out toward it, but Crane’s 
reached it first. He took it up. 

“ Have you any explanation to offer, Brindle- 
bury? ” he said. 

“ I can explain,” exclaimed Jane-Ellen. 

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“ I ’m sure you can,” Crane answered. “ The 
only question is, shall I believe your explanation.” 

“ He took it because it reminded him of me. 
That ’s the only reason he wanted it.” 

Crane looked from the miniature to the cook. 
He knew that this was also the only reason why 
he himself wanted it. 

“ Jane-Ellen,” he said, “ go downstairs and or- 
der the motor to come to the side door at once.” 

“ Mr. Crane, you ’re not going to have Brin 
arrested? ” 

He shook his head. 

“ I ought to, perhaps, but I am not going to. 
I ’m going to take him in the motor to what I 
consider a safe distance, and drop him.” 

“ Just like a stray cat,” gasped Brindlebury’s 
sister. 

“ Cats usually come back,” said the boy, with 
a return of his normal spirits. 

“ Cats have nine lives,” replied Crane, sig- 
nificantly. 

Something about the tone of this remark put 
an end to the conversation. Jane-Ellen obedi- 
ently left the room. Brindlebury struggled 
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frantically to strap his bulging bag, and succeeded 
only with the assistance of Crane. 

When they went downstairs, the motor was 
already ticking quietly at the side door. No one 
was visible, except Jane-Ellen, who was wistfully 
watching it. 

Brindlebury got in, and set his bag upright be- 
tween his knees; Crane got in, and had actually 
released the brake, when, looking up at the 
cook still standing there, he found himself 
saying : 

“ Do you want to come, too, Jane-Ellen, to see 
the last of your brother? ” 

Of course she did ; she looked hastily about and 
then turned toward the stairs, but Crane stopped 
her. 

“ No,” he said, “ don’t go up. There ’s a coat 
of mine there in the coat closet. Take that.” 

Immediately she reappeared in a heavy Irish 
frieze overcoat he had had made that spring in 
New Bond Street. It was an easy fit for Crane; 
it enveloped Jane-Ellen completely. The collar 
which she had contrived to turn up as she put the 
coat on, stood level with the top of her head ; the 
142 



At the sight of Crane, Jane-Ellen stopped with a gesture of the utmost 

horror 




COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


hem trailed on the ground, and the sleeves hung 
limp from below the elbows. She looked like a 
very small kitten wrapped up in a very large baby’s 
blanket. But she did not allow this superfluity 
of cloth to hamper her movements; she sprang 
into the little back seat, and they started. 

After about half an hour. Crane stopped the 
car. They were now in the outskirts of the main 
town of the district. 

“ This is where you get out,” he said. 

Brindlebury obeyed. 

“ Smithfield paid you your wages, I believe,” 
and Burton plunged into his own pocket. “ Well, 
there ’s something extra.” 

At this, a trembling might have been seen in 
the right sleeve of the frieze coat, and the next 
second, Jane-Ellen’s hand emerged from the cuff, 
and Crane for the first time experienced the touch 
of her fingers. She pushed his hand away from 
her brother’s. 

“ Don’t take that money, Brin,” she cried. 

Brindlebury’s hand dropped. 

” No, of course not. What do you take me 
for? ” he said. Then he snatched off his cap and 

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kissed his sister good-by, and, picking up his bag, 
he disappeared into the darkness. 

There was a moment’s silence between the other 
two, before Crane said: 

“ Better get into the front seat. You ’ll be 
more comfortable.” 

Holding up her coat, as if it were a coronation 
robe, Jane-Ellen stepped in, sat down, and 
wrapped it carefully about her knees — a process 
in which Crane by the greatest effort of self-con- 
trol did not join. Again the brake squeaked and 
the motor moved forward. 

A great deal has been said about silence as a 
method of spiritual communion, but few of us, in 
social situations, at least, have the courage of 
these convictions. Most hostesses, on looking 
about a silent dinner-table, would be more apt 
to think that they were watching a suspension of 
diplomatic relations, rather than an intercom- 
munication of souls. But there are moments for 
all of us when we value silence as highly as 
Maeterlinck himself and this, in Burton’s opinion, 
was one of them. 

The moonlight, so much more beautiful and 
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affecting than he had found it earlier in the eve- 
ning in the garden, the smooth, quick motion, the 
damp night air blowing against his face, made him 
acutely aware of the presence at his side of that 
small, still companion. He felt no need of 
speech, nor did he speculate as to her state of 
mind. He drove, and enjoyed life deeply. 

They were nearly at home again, before he 
asked : 

“ Why was it you did not wish your brother to 
take what I offered him?” 

“ Because,” she answered, in a tone of sim- 
plicity and sincerity he had never yet heard from 
her, “ it would not have been good for him. 
He ’s young, and takes things too easily. He 
ought not to have money he does not work for.” 

“ I am glad that you feel like that,” he said. 
“ I was afraid you refused to let him have it, be- 
cause you were angry at me for sending him 
away.” 

He was afraid that she would relapse into her 
old tone of mock servility and assure him that she 
would never be guilty of the liberty of criticizing 
her employer, but she did not. She said : 

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“ But I was not angry at you. I should not 
have respected you if you had done anything else.” 

He answered seriously: 

“You knew that I was sorry not to do what 
you asked me to do? ” 

“ Yes, I knew,” she said. 

They did not speak again. 

They left the car at the garage and walked to 
the house. There had been failure in coopera- 
tion, for Smithfield evidently had not known of 
the expedition. The side door was locked, and 
so was the front door. 

“ I suppose I ’d better ring,” said Crane reluc- 
tantly. Somehow he was not eager to face Smith- 
field’s cold, reproving glance. 

“ No, follow me,” whispered Jane-Ellen. 

She led him to the kitchen entrance and pointed 
to a window. 

“ I don’t believe that window has had a bolt for 
sixty years,” she said. 

“ And to think,” returned Crane, as he gently 
raised it, “ that before I took the house I com- 
plained of its being out of repair.” 

He climbed in and opened the kitchen door for 
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her. He had a match, and she knew the where- 
abouts of a candle. They still spoke in whispers. 
There was, of course, no real reason why they 
were so eager to let the household sleep undis- 
turbed, yet they were obviously united in the 
resolution to make no unnecessary sound. 

“Wouldn’t you like something to eat?” 
breathed Jane-Ellen. 

“ A good idea,” he answered. 

She divested herself of his coat and beckoned 
him to the ice-box. They had entirely ceased to 
be master and servant. 

“ Some of that chicken salad you had for din- 
ner,” she murmured, “ if any of it came down. 
I dare say it did n’t though. Smithfield ’s so fond 
of it.” 

Crane laughed. 

“ You mean he eats in the pantry? ” 

She nodded. 

“ All butlers do, and Smithfield ’s a little bit 
greedy, though you ’d never guess it, would 
you?” 

They laughed softly over Smithfield, as they 
spread out their simple meal on the kitchen table. 

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Jane-Ellen showed a faint disposition to wait upon 
her employer, but it was easily vanquished by his 
assertion that he would eat nothing unless she 
sat down, too. A few minutes later, it was he 
who was doing whatever work was to be done, 
and she sitting with her elbows on the table watch- 
ing him. There seemed, after all, nothing un- 
natural in this new relation. 

Presently, Willoughby, hearing the sound of 
dishes, or smelling the chicken salad, awoke and 
jumped on the table. 

“Do you mind him?” asked his mistress in 
melting tones. 

Crane did n’t mind him at all. He offered the 
cat a bit of chicken. Willoughby seemed to en- 
joy It, chewing It with quick little jerks of his 
head. And presently, he raised a paw and de- 
flected a fork which Crane was carrying to his 
own mouth. Even this Crane appeared to find 
amusing. 

Before they had finished, the kitchen clock be- 
hind them suddenly and discordantly struck once. 
Burton started and half turned his head, but she 
stopped him. 

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“ Let ’s guess what time it is,” she said. “ Of 
course, it ’s later than half past ten. It might be 
half past eleven.” 

“ Or even half past twelve.” 

“ It could be one.” 

“ But certainly not half past.” 

They looked around. It was half past. 

Jane-Ellen sprang up. 

“ Oh, how dreadful ! ” she exclaimed, without, 
however, any very real conviction. ” How ter- 
ribly late, and I have to get up so early in the 
morning.” 

‘‘ It makes me desperately ashamed,” said 
Crane, “ to think you have to get up to cook for 
all of us and that I can sleep just as late as I want 
to.” 

She laughed. 

“ If you have n’t anything worse to worry about 
than that, you ’re very lucky.” 

But he had something to worry about, and as 
soon as she was gone, he began to worry about it, 
namely, the painful and complicated situation of a 
man who has fallen in love with his cook. 


VIII 


M rs. FALKENER never came down to 
breakfast. At nine to the minute, her 
bell tinkled, and Lily staggered ilp to her room 
bearing a tray, from which, it subsequently ap- 
peared, many essentials had been forgotten; the 
next ten minutes were spent by the unfortunate 
housemaid in trips to the pantry in search of salt, 
powdered sugar or a tea-strainer. 

Cora, however, came down and poured out 
coffee for the two men. She looked handsome 
and vigorous in this occupation, and Crane, sitting 
oI)posite to her, wondered If It were his destiny to 
sit so for the rest of his life. He watched her 
thin white hands — strong as steel, they were — 
moving about among the cups. He had once ad- 
mired them intensely. But now he knew that 
hands did not have to be so firm and muscular to 
accomplish wonderful achievements In all sorts of 
ways. 


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At ten, Mrs. Falkener came swimming down 
the stairs, all suavity and brightness. The eve- 
ning before, while Crane had been struggling with 
the problem of Brindlebury’s misdeeds, she and 
Tucker had had another council of war. A new 
attack upon the cook had been planned, which they 
felt sure would bring to light delinquencies that 
even Crane could not overlook. 

“ Come, Burton,” she said as she entered the 
sitting-room, “ are n’t you ever going to offer to 
show me the kitchen? You know that to an old- 
fashioned housekeeper like myself. It is the most 
interesting part of the whole house.” 

Such interest. Crane felt inclined to answer, 
was not confined to old-fashioned housekeepers. 
Her suggestion roused conflicting desires in him; 
the desire to see Jane-Ellen, and the desire to 
protect her from Mrs. Falkener. 

“ Tuck could tell us all about it,” he said slyly. 

Tucker, who was reading the paper, pretended 
not to hear, and presently Crane rang the bell. 

“ Tell the cook, Smithfield,” he said, “ that 
Mrs. Falkener and I are coming down to inspect 
the kitchen in about ten minutes.” 

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When Smithfield had gone, Mrs. Falkener 
shook her finger at Crane. 

“ That was a mistake, my dear Burton,” she 
said, “ a great mistake. Take them unaware 
whenever you can; it is the only way to protect 
ourselves against the unscrupulous members of 
their class.” 

“ Crane,” said Tucker, without looking up from 
his paper, “ wants to give the young woman 
plenty of time to smuggle out any superfluous 
young man who may be visiting her at the mo- 
ment.” 

“ Well, I ’m no gum-shoe man. Tuck,” Burton 
replied, leaving all of his hearers in doubt as 
to whether or not he had emphasized the word 

u j n 

Tucker laughed sarcastically. 

“ No, my dear fellow,” he answered, “ your 
best friend would not accuse you of having tal- 
ents along the detective line.” 

“ Perhaps not,” replied Crane. “ And by the 
way, did I tell you that the miniature had turned 
up all right? ” 

Tucker’s face fell. He had depended a good 

154 


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deal on the loss of the miniature as a lever to oust 
the whole set of servants. 

“ No,” he said. “ Where was it discovered? ” 

“ Oh, it had just been moved,” answered 
Crane. “ It was lying on another table, when I 
happened to notice it.” He took it out of his 
pocket and looked at it. “ I think now, I ’ll keep 
it in my room for safety. You approve of that, 
don’t you. Tuck? ” 

Tucker, who felt that in some way he was be- 
ing deceived, would not answer, and in the pause 
Mrs. Falkener rose and said chattily, 

“Well, shall we be off?” 

“Coming with us, Solon?” 

“ No, I ’m not,” returned Tucker crossly. 

“ Did n’t mean to offend you,” Crane answered. 
“ I thought you liked kitchens, too.” 

Downstairs, they found the kitchen empty. 
Jane-Ellen was standing just outside the door 
watching Willoughby, who was exciting himself 
most unnecessarily over preparations which he was 
making to catch a bird that was hopping about in 
the grass near by. The great cat crouched, all 
still except the end of his tail, which twitched 

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ominously, then he rose, and, balancing himself 
almost imperceptibly on his four paws, seemed 
about to spring ; then abandoning this method, too, 
he crept a little nearer to his victim, his stomach 
almost touching the earth. And then the whole 
exhibition was ended by the bird, who, having 
accomplished its foraging expedition, lightly flew 
away, leaving Willoughby looking as foolish as a 
cat ever does look. 

Jane-Ellen stooped and patted him. 

“ You silly dear,” she said caressingly. 

It was Willoughby who first saw Crane. With 
a vivid recollection of the previous evening’s feast 
of chicken from the salad, the cat ran to him and 
bumped his nose repeatedly against Crane’s legs 
in token of fealty and gratitude. Burton felt un- 
duly flattered. He lifted Willoughby, who in- 
stantly made himself very soft and heavy in his 
arms and showed every disposition to settle down 
and go to sleep. 

Mrs. Falkener looked at him sentimentally. 

“ How all animals take to you. Burton, at first 
sight I ” she said. 

Crane bent over and replaced Willoughby 
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slowly on the ground, while Jane-Ellen turned 
her head away for an instant. Mrs. Falkener 
went on: 

“ What a nice, bright kitchen you have, Jane- 
Ellen. A good range, though old-fashioned. 
How bright you keep your copper. That ’s 
right.” She wandered away in her tour of in- 
spection. “ See, Burton, this blue plate. It 
looks to me as if it might have value. And this 
oak dresser — it must be two hundred years old.” 
She was across the room and her back was turned. 
Crane and the cook stood looking at each other. 
“How charming, how interesting!” Mrs. Falk- 
ener continued. “ And you would not believe me 
when I said that the kitchen was the most interest- 
ing part of the house.” 

“ I did not disagree with that,” said Crane, 
still looking at Jane-Ellen. 

“ Oh, my dear boy, you would never have come 
down if I had not made you.” 

“ One does n’t always do what one wants to 
do,” said Crane. 

Mrs. Falkener turned. The kitchen had re- 
vealed none of the enormities she had expected — 

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not even a man hidden In the kitchen closet, the 
door of which she had hopefully opened; but one 
chance still remained. The ice-box ! In her time 
she had known many Incriminating ice-boxes. She 
called loudly to be taken to It. 

“ It ’s this way, madame,” said the cook. 

Mrs. Falkener drew Crane aside. 

“ That,” she said, “ Is the very best way to 
judge of a cook’s economical powers. See how 
much she saves of the dishes that come from the 
upstairs table. Now, last night I happened to 
notice that the chicken salad went downstairs al- 
most untouched.” 

For the first time In years. Burton found him- 
self coloring. 

“ Oh, really? ” he stammered. “ I had an idea 
that we had eaten quite a lot of It.” 

” No,” returned Mrs. Falkener firmly, “ no, a 
good dish went down. Let us go and see.” 

Crane glanced at Jane-Ellen. He thought she 
had overheard. 

They reached the Ice-box; the cook lifted the 
lid, and Mrs. Falkener looked In. The first sight 
that greeted her eyes was the platter that had 
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borne the salad she had liked so much. It was 
almost empty. 

“ Why, Jane-Ellen,” she said, “ where is all the 
rest of that excellent salad ? ” 

At this question, Jane-Ellen, who was standing 
beside the chest, gave the lid a slight downward 
impulsion, so that it suddenly closed with a loud, 
heavy report, within half an inch of Mrs. Falk- 
ener’s nose. 

That lady turned to Burton. 

“ Burton,” she said, with the majesty of which 
she was at times capable, “ I leave it to you to de- 
cide whether or not this impossible young woman 
did that on purpose,” and so saying she swept 
away up the stairs, like a goddess reascending 
Olympus. 

“ Look here, Jane-Ellen,” said Crane, “ I don’t 
stand for that.” 

“ Oh, sir,” replied the culprit, with a return to 
an earlier manner, “ you surely don’t think I had 
anything to do with it? ” 

“ Unhappily, I was watching your hand at the 
time, and I know that you had.” 

Jane-Ellen completely changed her method. 

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“ Oh, well,” she said, “ you did not want her 
going on any more about the old salad, did you? ” 

“ I don’t want the end of my guest’s nose taken 
off.” 

“ It ’s rather a long nose,” said the cook dispas- 
sionately. 

“ Jane-Ellen, I am seriously displeased.” 

At this the cook had a new idea. She extracted 
a very small handkerchief from her pocket and 
unfolded it as she said : 

“ Yes, indeed, sir, I suppose I did utterly forget 
my place, but it ’s rather hard on a poor girl — 
one day you treat her as if she were an empress, 
and the next, just as if she were mud under 
your feet.” She pressed the handkerchief to her 
eyes. 

“ Jane-Ellen, you know I never treated you like 
mud under my feet.” 

“ It was only last night in my brother’s room,” 
she went on tearfully, “ that you scolded me for 
not being candid, and now at the very first candid 
thing I do, you turn on me like a lion — ” 

At this point Crane removed her hands and 
handkerchief from before her face, and revealed 
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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


the fact, which he already suspected, that she was 
smiling all the time. 

“ Jane-Ellen, what a dreadful fraud you are! ” 
he said quite seriously. 

“ No, Mr. Crane,” answered Jane-Ellen, 
briskly tucking away her handkerchief, now that 
its usefulness was over. “ No, I ’m not exactly 
a fraud. It ’s just that that ’s my way of enjoying 
myself, and you know, sometimes I think other 
people enjoy it, too.” 

“ Do you think Mrs. Falkener enjoys it? ” 

“ I was n’t thinking of Mrs. Falkener,” replied 
Jane-Ellen, with a twinkle in her eyes. 

“ Burton ! ” called Mrs. Falkener’s voice from 
the head of the stairs. 

Crane and his cook drew slightly closer to- 
gether, as if against a common enemy. 

“ Do you suppose she can have heard us? ” he 
asked. 

“ I think she ’s perfectly capable of trying to 
hear.” 

Crane smiled. 

“ I took a great risk, Jane-Ellen, when I advised 
you to be candid.” 


i6i 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ Burton ! ” said the voice again. 

“ Merciful powers I ” exclaimed Crane. “ She 
calls like Juliet’s nurse.” 

The cook laughed. 

“ But you must be prompter than Juliet was.” 

“ What do you know about Shakespeare, Jane- 
Ellen?” 

“ Moving pictures have been a great education 
to the lower classes, you know, sir.” 

He moved toward the stairs, but turned back 
to say, 

“ Good-by, Jane-Ellen.” 

She answered : 

“ ‘ Think you that we shall ever meet again? ’ ” 
and then even she seemed to feel that she had 
committed an imprudence and she dashed away to 
the kitchen. 

Crane ascended the stairs slowly, for he was 
trying to recall the lines that follow Juliet’s pa- 
thetic question, when he suddenly became aware 
of Mrs. Falkener’s feet planted firmly on the top 
step, and then of that lady’s whole majestic pres- 
ence. He pulled himself together with an effort. 

“ Do you suppose that girl could have dropped 
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that lid on purpose?” he asked, as if this were 
the question he had been so deeply pondering. 

“ I feel not the least doubt of it,” returned Mrs. 
Falkener. 

He shook-Jiis head. 

“ It seems almost incredible,” he answered, 
moving swiftly across the hall toward the sitting- 
room, where Tucker and Miss Falkener were 
visible. 

“ On the contrary,” replied the elder lady, “ it 
seems to me perfectly in keeping with the whole 
conduct of this extraordinary young person.” 
They had now entered the room, and she included 
Tucker and her daughter in an account of the in- 
cident. 

“ You know, Solon, and you, too, Cora, how 
easy I am on servants. I must admit, every one 
will confirm it, that my own servants adore me. 
They adore me, don’t they, Cora? No wonder. 
I see to their comfort. They have their own 
bath, and a sitting-room far better than anything 
I had myself as a young woman. But in return 
I do demand respect, absolute respect. And 
when I am looking into an ice-box, examining it, 
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at Burton’s special request, to have that young 
minx slam down the lid, almost catching my nose, 
Solon, I assure you, almost touching my nose, as 
she did it!” 

Tucker listened attentively, tapping his eye- 
glasses on his left palm. Then he said : 

“ And what did you do about it. Burton? ” 

Crane had gone to the bookcases and taken 
down a volume of Shakespeare. He was so pro- 
foundly immersed that Tucker had to repeat his 
question. This is what he was reading: 

Juliet: Think you that we shall ever meet 
again? 

Romeo: I doubt it not, and all our woes shall 
serve 

For pleasant converse in the days to 
come. 

He looked up, vainly trying tp suppress a smile. 

“ What did I do about what. Tuck? ” 

“ About your cook’s insulting Mrs. Falkener.” 

Crane replaced the volume and walked to the 
window. 

“ Oh,” he said, “ I stayed behind a moment — ” 
164 



Think you that we shall ever meet again ? 




COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ A moment! ” said Mrs. Falkener, with some- 
thing that would have been a snort in one less self- 
controlled. 

At this instant, Crane’s attention was attracted 
by a figure he saw crossing the grounds, and he 
decided to create a diversion. 

“ Oh, look ! ” he exclaimed. “ Do come and 
see the housemaid going out for a walk. Did 
you ever see anything smarter than she looks?” 

The diversion was of a more exciting nature 
than he had intended. Mrs. Falkener came to the 
window and uttering a piercing exclamation, she 
cried*: 

“ The woman has on Cora’s best hat! ” 

“Not really?” said Crane, but it did seem 
to him he remembered having seen the hat be- 
fore. 

“ It is, it is,” Mrs. Falkener went on, in some 
excitement. “ Call her back at once. Solon, do 
something. Call the woman back.” ' 

Tucker, thus appealed to, threw open the win- 
dow, and with an extremely creditable volume of 
voice, he roared: 

“Lily!” 


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The girl started and turned. He beckoned Im- 
periously. She approached. 

“ Come in here at once,” he said sternly. 

Mrs. Falkener sank Into a chair. 

“ This Is really too much,” she said, making 
fluttering gestures with her hands. “ Even you. 
Burton, will admit this is too much. Stand by me, 
Solon.” 

” Don’t say even I, Mrs. Falkener,” returned 
Crane, “ as if I had been indifferent to your com- 
fort.” 

“ Don’t be so excited. Mother,” said Cora. 
“ You know it probably is n’t my hat at all. I.lly 
has probably been copying mine.” 

Mrs. Falkener shook her head. 

“ I should know a Diane Duruy model any- 
where,” she said. 

At this moment, Lily entered, and good temper 
did not beam from her countenance. 

“ I had permission from Smithfield to go out,” 
she began defiantly. “ Smithfield sent me over 
to look up a boy to replace Brin — ” 

“ The trouble is not over your going out,” said 
Crane. 


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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ What is the trouble, then?” 

“ The trouble,” said Mrs. Falkener, seeing 
Crane hesitate for a word, “ is that you have on 
my daughter’s hat.” 

“Your daughter’s hat!” said Lily contemp- 
tuously. “ Nothing of the kind.” 

Mrs. Falkener turned to Tucker. 

“ This is intolerable. This is insufferable,” 
she cried. “ To have that woman standing there 
in Cora’s hat, which I chose myself and paid forty- 
five dollars for at a sale, and cheap, too, for a 
Diane Duruy model; to stand there and tell me 
I don’t know the hat when I see it — ” 

“ Cora,” said Crane, “ is that your hat? ” 

“ Why, yes, I ’m afraid it is,” answered Cora, 
rather reluctantly. 

“ Lily, have you any explanation to make? ” he 
asked. 

“ None at all,” replied the housemaid, looking 
like white granite. 

“ Cora,” said Crane, “ you did not by any 
chance say anything that could have led Lily to be- 
lieve you meant to give her the hat ? ” 

Miss Falkener smiled. 

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“ No,” she said. ” My mother would not en- 
courage such a generous impulse in regard to a 
French hat.” 

“ Then, Lily,” said Burton, “ take off the hat, 
and give it back to Miss Falkener, and go and 
pack your things and be out of the house in an 
hour.” 

“You must have her luggage searched,” said 
Tucker. 

“Give the hat back!” cried Mrs. Falkener. 
“ What good will that do ? Do you suppose that 
I would ever let Cora put it on her head again, 
after that woman has worn it? She may as well 
keep it now.” 

“ I shall,” answered Lily. “ It ’s mine.” 

The girl’s determination impressed Crane more 
than it did the others, though even he could 
not see any loop-hole of escape for her. He 
rang the bell, and when Smithfield appeared, he 
said: 

“ Smithfield, I have dismissed Lily. We 
found her leaving the house in one of Miss 
Falkener’s hats.” 

“ Oh, begging your pardon, no, sir,” said 
170 



“ Cora/' said Crane, “ is that your hat ? ” 



COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 

Smithfield. “ It is really not Miss Falkener’s hat 
Surely, Lily, you explained it? ” 

“ I don’t care to speak to them at all,” answered 
Lily. 

“ Oh, that ’s no way to speak to your employers, 
my girl,” said Smithfield. “ The explanation is 
this, sir: I understand those great French houses 
send out many hats alike, sir, and this one was 
given to Lily by a friend, by Mrs. Crosslett-Bill- 
ington, to be exact, sir, she thinking it a trifle 
youthful for herself after she had bought it, and 
I can’t but say she was right, sir, she being a lady 
now nearing sixty, though hardly looking forty- 
five. The first evening the ladies came, sir, when 
Lily had done unpacking their things, she men- 
tioned in the kitchen that Miss Falkener had a hat 
similar to her own, and we all advised her, sir, 
under the circumstances, not to wear it during the 
ladies’ stay, as being more suitable and respectful ; 
and she agreed not to, but young women when they 
have pretty things, dear me, sir, they do like to 
wear them, and that I presume is why she put on 
the hat, in spite of our warnings, and I ’m sure 
she regrets it heartily, sir.” 

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“ I don’t,” said Lily. “ I ’m right glad I did.” 

“ Tut, tut,” said Smithfield, “ no way to answer, 
no way to answer.” 

“ Cora,” Crane said, “ would you go up and see 
if your hat is in your room? ” Cora agreed and 
left the room at once. 

Complete silence reigned until she returned. 
She was carrying in her hand a hat, the exact dupli- 
cate of that which the housemaid wore. They 
looked from one to another. Lily’s triumph was 
complete. 

“ Lily,” said Crane, “ an apology seems to be 
due to you, which I have great pleasure in offering 
you, but I must say that if you had been just a trifle 
more civil, the whole mistake might have been 
cleared up sooner and more agreeably.” 

“ I think it outrageous,” observed Mrs. Falk- 
cner, rising. “ I think it perfectly outrageous that 
any servant should own a hat which anywhere but 
at a special sale must have cost sixty or seventy 
dollars.” 

“ And now I ’ll tell you what I think out- 
rageous,” said Lily, her soft Southern drawl tak- 
ing on a certain vigor, “ and that is that women 

174 


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like you, calling themselves ladies, should be 
free to browbeat and insult servants as much as 
they please — ” 

“ Shut up, Lily,” said Smithfield, but she paid 
no attention. 

“ No,” she said, “ no one knows what I ’ve put 
up with from this Insolent old harridan, and now 
I am going to say what I think.” 

“ Oh, no, Lily,” said Crane, taking her by the 
arm, “ you really are not. We ’re all sorry for 
the incident, but really, you know you can’t be al- 
lowed to talk like that.” 

“ But, Mr. Crane,” drawled Lily, “ you don’t 
appreciate what a dreadful woman she is — no 
one could who did not have to hook her up every 
evening.” 

Between Smithfield and Crane, she was hustled 
out of the room. 

Alone in the hall. Crane and his butler held a 
consultation. 

” She ’s got to go, Smithfield. Why In the 
world would n’t she hold her tongue ? Poor girl, 
I felt every sympathy with her.” 

“ Oh, sir,” exclaimed Smithfield, “ what shall 

175 ; 


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we do? Jane-Ellen and I really can’t run the 
house entirely alone, sir.” 

“ Of course not, of course not,” Burton an- 
swered. “ You must get some more servants. 
Get as many as you please — black, white, or red 
— but for heaven’s sake get the kind that won’t be 
impertinent to Mrs. Falkener.” 

Smithfield shook his head. 

“ That ’s a kind will be hard to find, sir, beg- 
ging your pardon,” he observed. 

Crane thought it best to ignore this remark. 

“ I tell you what to do,” he said. “ Call up 
Mr. Eliot and say we should all be glad to accept 
his invitation to lunch to-day if he can still have 
us. That will give you a little time to look about 
you. By to-morrow you ought to be able to find 
some one.” 

He waited to get Eliot’s answer before he re- 
turned to the sitting-room, where he saw that 
Tucker and Mrs. Falkener had had a long, com- 
fortable talk about their grievances and their own 
general righteousness. He hated to break into 
the calm that had succeeded by announcing that 
they were all going out to lunch. 

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“ Burton,” said Mrs. Falkener, directing a 
stern glace at her daughter, “ I explained to you 
yesterday that was an invitation I did not care to 
accept.” 

“ I know,” said Crane, “ but my household is 
now so short-handed that it seemed a question of 
lunching out or getting no lunch at all. If you 
really object to going to Eliot’s, I dare say they 
could give you something cold at home, if you 
did not mind that. You will come, won’t you, 
Cora?” 

“ With pleasure,” answered Cora. 

Crane’s manner was unusually decisive, and 
Mrs. Falkener saw that it was time to make things 
smooth. 

“ Oh, no,” she said. “ No, if you are all go- 
ing, I shall go, too. Only, home is so delightful, 
I hate the thought of leaving it.” 

“ It has n’t seemed very delightful to me for 
the past few minutes,” answered Burton, “ but 
I ’m glad if you ’ve enjoyed it.” 

“ Ah, Burton, my dear, you take these things 
too seriously,” replied Mrs. Falkener. “ A lit- 
tle trouble with the servants — an everyday oc- 
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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


currence in a woman’s life. You of the stronger 
sex must not let it worry you so much. When 
you ’ve kept house as many years as I have, you ’ll 
learn that the great thing is to be firm from the 
beginning. That ’s the only criticism I could make 
of you, Burt, a little weak, a little weak.” 

Tucker here rose, pressing his hand over his 
eyes. 

“ I think, if you don’t mind, I won’t go,” he 
said. “ I ’ve a slight headache. Oh, nothing 
much, but I ’ll lunch quietly here, if you ’ll let me 
— a slice of cold meat and a glass of sherry is all 
I shall require.” 

If Crane were weak, he did not look so at this 
moment. 

“ I am sorry, Solon,” he answered, “ but it 
would be very much more convenient, if you went 
with us.” He had no intention of leaving Tucker 
alone in the house with Jane-Ellen, while Smithfield 
was scouring the countryside for fresh servants. 

“ I ’m not thinking so much of myself,” said 
Tucker, “ but of you. I fear I should not be 
much of an addition to the party.” 

“ But I think of you. Tuck,” answered his host. 
178 


\ COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 

“ What in the world would there be for you to do 
at home, except talk to the cook? ” 

Tucker said, rather ungraciously, that of course 
he would go if Crane wished him to, but that — 
Crane, however, did not allow him to finish his 
sentence. 

“ 1 hank you,” he said briskly. “ That will be 
delightful. We shall be starting at half-past 
twelve.” 


179 


IX 


E LIOT’S large library, to which Crane and his 
party were led on their arrival, looked as 
only a room can look which has been occupied for 
several hours by a number of idle men. All the 
sofa cushions were on the floor, all the newspapers 
were on the sofas, cigarette ashes were every- 
where, and the air was heavy with a combination 
of wood and tobacco smoke, everybody’s hair was 
ruffled, as if they had all been sitting on the back 
of their heads, and Eliot, himself, now standing 
commandingly on the hearth-rug, was saying: 

“ Yes, and he did not have a sound leg when 
he bought him, and that must have been in 1909, 
for I remember it was the last year I went to 
Melton — ” He broke off reluctantly to greet his 
guests. 

Lefferts, who looked peculiarly neat and fresh 
among his companions, approached Burton, who 
was beside Mrs. Falkener. 

“ They have been talking for three hours,” he 
180 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


observed, “ about a splint on the nigh foreleg of 
a gray horse that does n’t belong to any of them. 
Sit down, Mrs. Falkener, and let us have a little 
rational conversation. Does n’t that idea attract 
you?” 

“ Not particularly, since you ask me,” replied 
Mrs. Falkener, not deigning even to look at the 
poet, but sweeping her head about slowly as if 
scanning vast horizons. 

“ The .rational does n’t attract you,” Lefferts 
went on cheerfully. “ Well, then we must try 
something else. How about the fantastic-sar- 
donical, or the comic-fantastical, or even better, 
the—” 

But Mrs. Falkener, uttering a slight exclama- 
tion of impatience, moved away. 

Lefferts turned to Crane, with his unruffled 
smile. 

“ She does n’t like me,” he said. 

“ Cora,” he added, very slightly raising his voice 
so as to attract the attention of Miss Falkener, 
who immediately approached them, “ Cora, why is 
it your mother hates me so much? ” 

“ She certainly does,” returned Cora frankly. 

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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ You know, Leonard, you are really rather stupid 
with her. You always begin by saying things she 
doesn’t understand, and of course no one likes 
that.” 

Lefferts sighed. 

” You see, she stimulates me so tremendously. 
One gets used to just merely boring or depressing 
one’s friends, but to be actively hated is exciting. 
People who have lived through blood feuds and 
tong wars tell you that there is no excitement com- 
parable to it. I feel a little like the leader of a 
tong whenever I meet Mrs. Falkener. Cora, 
would you belong to my tong, or would you 
feel loyalty demanded your remaining in your 
mother’s?” 

They went in to luncheon before Cora was ob- 
liged to answer, and here Lefferts contrived to sit 
next to her by the comparatively simple expedient 
of making the man who had already seated him- 
self at her side get up and yield him the place. 

Crane, sitting between his host and another man, 
enjoyed a period of quiet. Without his exactly 
arranging it, a definite plan for the afternoon was 
growing up in his mind — a plan which, it must be 
182 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


confessed, had been first suggested by Tucker’s 
idea of staying at home, a plan based on a vision 
of Jane-Ellen and Willoughby holding the kitchen 
in solitary state. 

Crane knew that luncheons at Eliot’s were long 
ceremonies. Food was served and eaten slowly, 
you sat a long time over coffee and cigars, and at 
the smallest encouragement, Eliot would bring out 
his grandfather’s Madeira. And after that you 
were unusually lucky if you escaped a visit to the 
stables, and that meant the whole afternoon. 

So he awaited a good opportunity after lunch 
was over, when Tucker, under pretense of reading 
a newspaper, had sunk into a comfortable doze, 
and Mrs. Falkener, while carrying on a fairly 
connected conversation with Eliot, was really con- 
centrated on preventing Lefferts from taking Cora 
into another room. This was Crane’s chance. 
He slipped into the hall, found his coat and hat, 
unearthed his chauffeur and motor, and drove 
quickly home, sending back the car at once to wait 
for the others. 

He did not, as his impulse was, go in the kitchen 
way. He did not want to do anything that might 

183 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


annoy Jane-Ellen. At the same time, he rebelled 
at the notion of having always to offer an excuse 
for seeing her, as if he were so superior a being 
that he had to explain how he could stoop to the 
level of her society. He wanted to say frankly 
that he had come home because he wanted more 
than anything in the world to see her again. 

The first thing he noticed as he went up the steps 
of the piazza was Willoughby sleeping in the 
warm afternoon sun. Then he was aware of the 
sound of a victrola playing dance music. The 
hall-door stood wide open; he looked in. Smith- 
field and Jane-Ellen were dancing. 

Though no dancer himself. Crane had never 
been aware of any prejudice on the subject; in- 
deed, he had sometimes thought that those who 
protested were more dangerously suggestive than 
the dances themselves. But now he felt a wave of 
protest sweep over him ; the closeness, the identity 
of intention, seemed to him an intolerable form of 
intimacy. 

The two were quite unconscious of his presence, 
and he stood there for several minutes, stood 
there, indeed, until Jane-Ellen’s hair fell down and 
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she had to stop to rearrange it. She looked very 
pretty as she stood panting and putting’ it up 
again, but she exerted no attraction upon Crane. 
Disgust, he thought, was all he now felt. One did 
not, after all, as he told himself, enter into com- 
petition with one’s own butler. 

He went quietly away, ordered a horse and 
went for a long ride. A man not very easily 
moved emotionally, he had never experienced the 
sensation of jealousy, and he now supposed him- 
self to have reached as calm a judgment as any in 
his life. Everything he had ever heard to Jane- 
Ellen’s discredit, every intimation of Tucker’s, 
every sneer of Mrs. Falkener’s, came back to him 
now. He would like to have sent for her and in 
the most scathing terms told her what he thought 
of her — an interview which he imagined as very 
different from his former reproof. But he de- 
cided it would be simpler and more dignified never 
to notice her in any way again. On this deci- 
sion he at last turned his horse’s head home- 
ward. 

Smithfield let him in, as calm and imperturbable 
as ever. 

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“ Your afternoon been satisfactory, Smith- 
field? ” inquired his employer. 

Smithfield stared. 

“ I beg pardon, sir? ” 

“ Have you succeeded in finding a boy to re- 
place Brindlebury? ” 

The butler’s face cleared. 

“ Oh, yes, I believe I have — not a boy, exactly, 
quite an elderly man, but one who promises to 
do, sir.” 

“ Good.” Crane turned away, but the man fol- 
lowed him. 

“ Miss Falkener asked me to tell you when you 
came in, sir, that she would be glad of a word with 
you. She ’s in your office.” 

Crane stood absolutely still for a second or two, 
and as he stood, his jaw slowly set, as he took a 
resolution. Then he opened the door of his of- 
fice and went in. 

Two personalities sometimes advance to a meet- 
ing with intentions as opposite as those of two 
trains on a single track. Crane and Cora were 
both too much absorbed in their own aims to ob- 
serve the signals of the other. 

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“ Cora,” began Crane, with all the solemnity of 
which the two syllables were capable. 

“ Oh, Burton,” cried the girl, “ why did you 
leave Mr. Eliot’s like that? It has worried me so 
much. Did anything happen to annoy you ? 
What was it? ” 

“ I sent the car right back for you.” 

“ It was n’t the car I wanted.” 

Crane began at once to feel guilty, the form 
of egotism hardest to eradicate from the human 
heart. 

“ I ’m sorry if I seemed rude, my dear Cora. 
I thought you were settled and content with Lef- 
ferts. I did not suppose any one would no- 
tice — ” 

“ Your absence? Oh, Burt! ” 

He became aware of a suppressed excitement, 
an imminent outburst of some sort. A sudden 
terror swept over him, terror of the future, of 
the deed he was about to do, terror even of this 
strange and utterly unknown woman whom he 
was about to make a part of his daily life, as long 
as days existed. For a second he had an illusion 
that he had never seen, never spoken to her be- 
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fore, and as he struggled against this queer ab- 
normality, he heard that in set, clear and not 
ill-chosen terms he was asking her to marry 
him. 

She clasped her hands together. 

“ Oh, it ’s just what I was trying to prevent.” 

“ To prevent? ” 

“ Burt, I Ve treated you so badly.” 

He looked at her without expression. 

“ Well, let ’s get the facts before we decide on 
that.” 

The facts, Cora intimated, were terrible. She 
was already engaged. 

“To Lefferts?” 

She nodded tragically. 

Crane felt a strong inclination to laugh. The 
world took on a new aspect. Reality returned 
with a rush, and with it a strong, friendly affec- 
tion for Cora. He hardly heard her long and 
passionate self-justification. She knew, she said, 
that she had given him every encouragement. 
Well, the truth was she had simply made up her 
mind to marry him; nothing would have pleased 
her mother more, but she did not intend to shelter 
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herself behind obedience to her mother; she had 
intended to do it for her own ends. 

“ That was what I tried to tell you last evening 
In the garden, Burt. I deliberately schemed to 
marry you, but you must n’t think I did not like 
and admire you, in a way — ” 

“ There ’s only one way, Cora.” 

This sent her off again into the depths of self- 
abasement. She had no excuse to offer, she kept 
protesting, and offered a dozen; the most potent 
being her uncertainty of Crane’s own feelings for 
her. 

“ You behaved so strangely for a man in love, 
Burt,” she wailed, “ I was never sure.” 

“ In the sense you mean, I was not In love with 
you, Cora.” 

“ And yet, you want to marry me ? ” 

“ In your own words, I liked and admired you, 
but I was not in love. The humiliating truth is, 
my dear girl, that I was so fatuous as to believe 
that you were fond of me.” 

There was a short silence, and then Cora ex- 
claimed candidly: 

“ Are n’t people queer ! Here I have been 
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worrying myself sick over my treatment of you, 
and now that I find you are not made unhappy 
by it, do you know what I feel? Disappointed, 
disappointed somehow, that you don’t love 
me!” 

Crane laughed. 

“ I also,” he said, “ have been slightly oppressed 
by the responsibility of your fancied affection, and 
I, too, am conscious of a certain flatness in facing 
the truth.” 

Cora hardly listened. 

“ It seems so queer you don’t love me,” 
she murmured. “ Why don’t you love me, 
Burt?” 

At this they both laughed, and went on presently 
to the more detailed consideration of Cora’s af- 
fairs. She and Lefferts had met the winter be- 
fore; she had not liked him at first, prejudiced 
perhaps by the fact that he was a poet, and that 
he pretended to dislike all the things she cared for, 
but she had found, almost at once, that he under- 
stood more about the things he hated than most 
men did about their favorite topics. 

“ He ’s really wonderful, Burt,” she said. 

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“ He understands everything, every one. Do you 
know, he told me yesterday that I need n’t worry 
about you — that you were n’t in love with me. 
Only I did not believe him. He said : ‘ What 

confuses you, my dear, is that Crane is undoubt- 
edly in love, one sees that clearly enough, but not 
with you.’ ” 

“ He did not just hit it there, though,” an- 
swered Crane, in a rather feeble tone. Cora, 
however, was in a condition of mind in which it 
was not difficult to distract her, and she continued 
without paying any further attention to the ex- 
ample of Lefferts’ extraordinary insight. She 
went on to say that she had had no idea that she 
was in love, until one day when she found herself 
speaking of it as if it had always been. Crane 
asked about Lefferts’ worldly prospects, which 
turned out to be extremely dark. Had he a pro- 
fession? Yes, such a strange one for a poet — 
he was an expert statistician, but, Cora sighed, 
there did not seem to be a very large demand for 
his abilities. 

Among the many minor responsibilities in- 
herited from his father. Crane remembered a sta- 
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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


tistical publication. He immediately offered its 
editorship to Lefferts. Cora’s answer was to fling 
her arms about his neck. 

“ Oh, Burt,” she said, “ you really are an 
angel 1 ” 

It was Crane’s idea of what would have hap- 
pened if Mrs. Falkener had entered at this mo- 
ment, which she did not, that made him ask how- 
matters stood in regard to her. 

“ She does n’t know,” answered Cora, “ and I 
don’t think she even suspects, and I ’m such a cow- 
ard I can’t make up my mind to tell her. Every 
time I see Leonard he asks me if I have, and now 
he is threatening to do it himself, and that you 
know, Burt, would be fatal.” 

“ Cora,” said Crane, “ I am about to prove that 
I am no fair weather friend. With your permis- 
sion, I will tell your mother.” 

No permission was ever more easily secured. 

It was now five o’clock, an hour when the elder 
lady became restless if not served with a little tea 
and attention. Crane rang and ordered tea for 
two served in the office, and then sent Smithfield 
to ask Mrs. Falkener if he might have a word with 
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her. She and her daughter passed each other on 
the threshold. 

“ How cozy this is,” she began as she seated 
herself by the fire. “ Smithfield keeps the silver 
bright, but I ’m afraid he has no judgment. 
Have you seen the man he has engaged instead of 
that dreadful boy? — why, he ’s so old and lame 
he can hardly get up and down stairs. He ’ll 
never do. Burton, take my word for that.” 

“ I have something more serious to say to you 
than the discussion of domestic matters, Mrs. 
Falkener,” said Crane; and for one of the few 
times in her life, Mrs. Falkener forgot that the 
house contained such a thing as servants. A 
more important idea took possession of her at- 
tention. 

Burton began to speak about romance. He 
said he did not know exactly how an older genera- 
tion than his looked at such questions ; for his own 
part, he regarded himself in many ways as a prac- 
tical and hard-headed man, and yet more and 
more he found himself gravitating to the belief 
that romance, love, the drawing together for mu- 
tual strength and happiness of two individuals,* 

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was the only basis for individual life. People 
talked of the modem taste for luxury; to his mind 
there was no luxury like a congenial companion, 
no hardship like having to go through life with- 
out it. Love — did Mrs. Falkener believe in 
love? 

“Do I believe in love, my dear Burt?” she 
cried. “What else is there to believe in? No 
girl, no nice girl, ever marries for any othei; 
reason. Oh, they try sometimes to be mercen- 
ary, but they don’t succeed. I could never for- 
give a woman for considering anything else.” 

“ I thought you would feel like that,” said 
Crane. “ I thought Cora was wrong in thinking 
you would oppose her. For, prudent or not from 
a worldly point of view, there is no doubt that she 
and Lefferts are in love.” 

The blow was a cruel one, and perhaps cruelly 
administered. Mrs. Falkener, even in the first 
instant of disaster, saw and took the only way out. 
Love, yes. But this was not love, this was a mere 
infatuation on one side, and a dark and wicked 
plot on the other. She would never forgive Bur- 
ton, never, for being a party to this scheme to 
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throw her daughter, her dear Cora, into the arms 
of this adventurer. Burton, who had always pro- 
fessed such friendship for her! She would not 
stay another moment in his house. There was a 
six-thirty train to the North, and she and her mis- 
guided daughter would take it. 

Crane began to see why Cora, for all her phys- 
ical courage, dreaded a disagreement with her 
mother. He himself felt as if an avalanche had 
passed over him, leaving him alive but dazed. 

Mrs. Falkener sat with her handkerchief 
pressed to her eyes, not so much to wipe away her 
tears, for she was not crying, but to shut out the 
sight of her perfidious young host. 

“ Be so kind,” she directed from behind this 
veil, “ as to give orders for the packing of my 
trunks, and let Cora know that we are leaving im- 
mediately.” 

Burton hesitated. 

“ I am afraid, since the housemaid has left, 
there is n’t any one to pack for you, Mrs. Falk- 
ener,” he said. “ Won’t you delay your going un- 
til to-morrow? I can’t bear to have you leave me 
like this.” 


195 


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Mrs. Falkener shook her head. 

“ Call Solon,” she said. “ No, don’t ask me to 
stay. And why, pray, can’t the cook make herself 
useful, for once? ” 

Mrs. Falkener was not, of course, in a position 
to know that Crane would not at the moment stoop 
to ask any favor of Jane-Ellen. He was glad of 
an excuse to escape, however, and summon Solon 
to take his place. He found Smithfield In the 
hall and explained to him that the ladies were 
called suddenly away, and then he himself walked 
down to the garage to arrange for their departure. 

When he came back he found the house in the 
sort of turmoil that only a thoroughly executive 
woman in a bad temper can create. Smithfield, 
Cora and Jane-Ellen seemed to be all together en- 
gaged In packing. Solon and the new man were 
running up and down stairs with forgotten books 
and coats and umbrellas, while Mrs. Falkener was 
exercising a general and unflattering supervision 
of every one’s activities. To say the new man 
was running is Inaccurate. Even Tucker’s digni- 
fied celerity hardly deserves such a word. But 
the new man, crippled and bent as he was, attained 
196 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


only such velocity as was consistent with a per- 
fectly stiff left leg. Crane really felt he ought to 
Interfere on his behalf, when he saw him laboring 
downstairs with heavy bags and bundles. He 
probably would have done so, had not his mind 
been distracted by coming unexpectedly upon a 
little scene In the upper hall. Cora was trying to 
press a fee into the hand of Jane-Ellen, and Jane- 
Ellen was refusing It. Both were flushed and em- 
barrassed. 

“ I wanted to give you this because — ” 

“ Oh, I could n’t, really; I ’ve not done any — ” 
“ Oh, you ’ve been such a — ” 

“ Oh, no, miss, I ’ve not done — ” 

The approach of Crane enabled the cook to es- 
cape. Cora turned to Burton. 

“ She ’s worked so hard, and she would n’t take 
a tip,” she said. “ And you never felt anything 
like her little hands, Burt. It ’s like touching a 
bird.” 

“ Yes, I know,” said Crane. ” I mean, they 
look so. I want just a word with you, Cora,” 
he continued, rather rapidly. “ I ’m afraid I 
have n’t done you much good except that your 
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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


mother is angrier with me than she is with you, and 
that ’s something.” 

“ Oh, I don’t care, now it ’s over,” she an- 
swered. “ And you ’ll tell Len this evening all 
that ’s happened, and where to write to me, and 
we shall both be grateful to you as long as we 
live.” 

At this moment, Mrs. Falkener in hat, veil, and 
wrap swept out of her room, followed by Smith- 
field, Tucker and the old man, carrying the last of 
her possessions. The moment of departure had 
come. 


198 


X 


FTER the departure of the ladies, Tucker 



-ZJl and Crane stood an instant in silence on the 
piazza. Solon, who had been waked from his cus- 
tomary afternoon nap by the frantic summons of 
Mrs. Falkener, was still a little confused as to all 
that had happened, and had gathered nothing 
clearly except that Burton was in some way very 
much to be blamed. 

“ It ’s too bad,” he observed, “ to have them go 
off like that. We shall miss them, I fear.” 

Crane was standing with his hands in his pock- 
ets, watching the tail-light as it disappeared down 
the drive. 

“ Let us avoid that. Tuck, by going away our- 
selves.” 

“ You mean to leave here? ” 

“Why not? The experiment has not struck 
me as a very happy one. Our servants have gone, 
our guests have left us, and for my part, I am 
eager to be off as well.” 


199 


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The time had come, then, when Jane-Ellen was 
to be friendless and out of a job ; the third act was 
here. 

“ Anything that suits you pleases me. Burton,” 
said Tucker. 

“ In that case,” answered Crane, “ I will tele- 
phone Reed to come over at once and make ar- 
rangements for giving up the house. We can’t, 
I suppose, catch that night train, but with luck we 
may get away to-morrow morning.” 

“ You seem in a great hurry.” 

“ I ’d like never to see the place again,” re- 
turned Burton. 

In the moment of silence that followed this 
heartfelt exclamation, a figure came briskly around 
the corner of the piazza, a figure discernible in 
the light shed by the front door. 

“ Oh, come here,” said Crane. 

The figure betrayed no sign of having heard, un- 
less a slight accentuation in its limp might be so 
interpreted. 

“ What ’s your name? ” shouted Burton. 

The old man looked up. 

“ Yes, yes,” he said, in a high shaking voice. 


200 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ I ’m lame; you ’re right there, sir. I ’ve been 
lame these twenty years, and carrying down all 
them trunks has put sich a crick in my back as 
never was.” 

“ I asked you your name,” repeated his em- 
ployer. 

“When I came? Why, this afternoon, sir. 
It was your butler engaged me. I worked at the 
hotel here once, and Mr. Smithfield he come to 
my wife and says, ‘ Susan,’ he says, he knowing 
her since he was a little boy — ” 

“ Let me look at you,” said Crane sternly. 

But the elderly man, still talking to himself, 
retreated into the shadow. 

And then Tucker was surprised to hear his host 
exclaim with violence : 

“ By Jove, the young devil,” and to see him 
hurl himself off the piazza at its highest point. 
He would have landed actually on top of his de- 
crepit servitor, had not the old man developed an 
activity utterly unsuspected by Tucker, which en- 
abled him to get away down the avenue with a 
speed that Crane could not surpass. 

“ Well, well, what are we coming to? ” Tucker 


201 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


murmured as he watched them dodge and double 
around trees and bushes. Presently they passed 
out of the light from the house, and only the 
sound of their feet beating on the hard avenue in- 
dicated that the fugitive had taken to the open. 

Solon was still peering nervously into the dark 
when at last his host returned. Crane was breath- 
ing hard, and held in his hand a small furry object 
that Tucker made out gradually to be a neat gray 
wig. 

“ Oh,” said Burton, still panting and slapping 
his side, “ I have n’t run so hard since I was in col- 
lege. But I should have got him If it had n’t been 
for his superior knowledge of the ground.” 

“ My dear Burton,” said Tucker crossly, “ what 
in the world have you been doing? ” 

“ What have I been doing? I ’ve been trying 
to catch that wretched boy, Brindlebury, but It ’s 
as well I did n’t, I dare say. I thought his limp 
a little spectacular this afternoon when the trunks 
were being carried down. But his deafness — 
the young fool 1 — that deafness, never found any- 
where but on the comic stage, was too much for 
me. He runs fast, I ’ll say that for him. He led 


202 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


me through a bramble hedge; backed through, 
himself. That ’s when I got his wig.” 

“ I should not be surprised if we all were mur- 
dered in our beds,” said Tucker. 

“ That ’s right. Tuck,” said Crane, “ look on 
the cheerful side. Come with me now, while I 
speak to Smithfield. I want to know what he has 
to say for himself.” 

Smithfield, looking particularly elegant in his 
shirt sleeves, a costume which shows off a slim 
figure to great advantage, was rather languidly 
setting the dinner-table for two ; that is to say, he 
was rubbing a wine-glass, shaped like a miniature 
New England elm-tree, to remove the faint im- 
print of his own fingers. 

“ Smithfield,” said Crane briskly, “ I ’m afraid 
your new useful man is n’t going to be very use- 
ful. He seems to me too old.” 

Smithfield placed the glass deliberately upon the 
table. 

“ He ’s not so old as he appears, sir,” he an- 
swered. “ Only sixty-six his next birthday.” 

“ A married man? ” 

“ No, sir, a widower of many years. His wife 
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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


died when her first baby was born — that ’s Mr. 
Crosslett-BIlIington’s present chauffeur. That ’s 
how I happened to get the old fellow. And when 
the rheumatism — ” 

“ Smithfield,” said Crane, “ that ’s about 
enough. Put down that glass, put on your coat 
and hat, and get out. You ’re lying to me, and 
you ’ve been lying to me from the beginning. 
Don’t stay to pack your things ; you can settle all 
that with Mr. Reed to-morrow. Get out of my 
house, and don’t let me see you again. And,” he 
added, throwing the gray wig into his hands, 
“ there ’s a souvenir for you.” 

Smithfield, without the least change of expres- 
sion, caught the wig, bowed, and withdrew. 

“ And now, Tuck,” Crane added, turning to his 
lawyer, “ I wish you would go and telephone Reed 
to come here at once and clear this whole thing 
up. Tell him I ’ll send the motor for him as soon 
as it comes back.” 

“ It ’s dinner-time now,” observed Tucker. 

“ Ask him to dinner then,” said Crane. “ I 
must go and see that Smithfield really gets out of 
this house.” 


204 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


Both tasks had been accomplished when at about 
eight o’clock Tucker and Crane again met in the 
hall. Smithfield had been actually seen off the 
place, Tucker had telephoned Reed and despatched 
the motor for him, and now the sound of an ap- 
proaching car was heard. 

“ That can’t be Reed, yet,” said Tucker, “ there 
has n’t been time.” 

Crane shook his head. 

“ It is n’t the sound of my engine, either,” he 
answered. 

Headlights came sweeping up the drive, and a 
few minutes later, Lefiferts, in full evening dress, 
entered the house. 

“ I ’m afraid I ’m a little bit late,” he said, “ but 
I missed a turn.” 

For an instant Crane regarded him blankly. 
Then he remembered that once, ages before, or 
perhaps no earlier than that very afternoon, he 
had invited Lefferts to dinner. And at the same 
time he realized what had not heretofore occurred 
to him, that there was no one in the house to serve 
dinner, except Jane-Ellen, who had, in all proba- 
bility, cooked dinner for only two. Reed might 
205 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


be there at any minute. It was really necessary, 
in so acute a domestic crisis, to put pride in his 
pocket and go downstairs and speak to his cook. 

He put his hand on Lefferts’ shoulder. 

“ Awfully sorry, my dear fellow,” he said, 
“ that things are not quite as anticipated. Tucker 
will tell you we have had rather a stormy after- 
noon. Give him a cigarette and a cocktail. Tuck, 
and I ’ll be back in a minute.” He disappeared 
down the kitchen stairs. 

With what different feelings, he said to himself, 
did he now descend those stairs; but, when he 
was actually in the kitchen, when Willoughby was 
once again bounding forward to greet him, and 
Jane-Ellen was allowing herself that slow curved 
smile of hers, he was surprised and disappointed to 
find that his feelings were, after all, much the same 
as before. Over his manner, however, he was 
still master, and that was cold and formal in the 
extreme. 

“ I wanted to speak to you, Jane-Ellen,” he be- 
gan, but she interrupted. 

“ This time,” she said gaily, “ I know what it is 
that you are going to scold about.” 

206 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


“ I am not going to scold.” 

She laughed. 

“ Well, that ’s a wonder,” and glancing at him 
she was astonished to find no answering smile. 
“ Are you really angry at me,” she asked, “ on ac- 
count of this afternoon? ” 

“ This afternoon? ” 

“ On account of that silly plan about Brindle- 
bury? I did not know they were going to do it, 
and when it was done, I could n’t betray them, 
could I?” 

Crane made a gesture that seemed to indicate 
that he really had no means of judging what his 
cook might or might not do. 

“ You believe me, don’t you? ” 

“ Believe you? ” said Crane. “ I have n’t con- 
sidered the question one way or the other.” 

“ Why, Mr. Crane,” said Jane-Ellen, “ what- 
ever has come over you that you should speak like 
that?” 

“ This has come over me,” answered Crane, 
“ that I came down here in a hurry to give 
some orders and not to discuss the question of ve- 
racity.” 


207 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


The figure of Jane-Ellen stiffened, she clasped 
her hands behind her back. 

“And what are your orders?” she said, in a 
tone of direful monotony. 

Crane, as has been stated, was no coward, and 
even if he had been, anger would have lent him 
courage. 

“ There are two gentlemen coming to dine - — 
four in all,” and as he saw Jane-Ellen slightly beck 
her head at this, he added recklessly, “ as Smith- 
field is gone, you will have to serve dinner as well 
as cook it.” 

“ No,” replied the cook. “ No, Indeed. Cer- 
tainly not. I was engaged to cook, and I will 
cook to the very best of my abilities, but I was not 
engaged to be a maid of all work.” 

“ You were engaged to do as you ’re told.” 

There you are mistaken.” 

“ Jane-Ellen, you will serve dinner.” 

“ Mr. Crane, I will not.” 

The problem of the irresistible force and the 
immovable body seemed about to be demonstrated. 
They looked each other steadily and hostllely in 
the eyes. 


208 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

“ We seem,” said Crane, “ to be dealing with 
the eternal problem between employer and em- 
ployee. You ’re not lazy, the work before you is 
nothing, but you deliberately choose to stand on 
your rights, on a purely technical point — ” 

“ I do nothing of the kind.” 

“ What are you doing then? ” 

“ I ’m making myself just as disagreeable as 
I can,” answered Jane-Ellen. “ Of course, I 
should have been delighted to do anything for any 
one who asked me politely. But when a man 
comes into my kitchen and talks about giving or- 
ders, and my doing as I ’m told, and serving din- 
ner, why, my answer is, he ought to have thought 
of his extra guests before he dismissed my 
brothers — ” 

“ Your brothers 1 ” cried Crane. “ Do you 
mean to say that Smithfield is your brother too? ” 
“ Well, I did n’t mean to tell you,” said the 
cook crossly, “ but it happens to be true.” 

From the point of view of the irresistible force, 
the problem was now completely resolved. 

“ O Jane-Ellen! ” he cried, “ why in the world 
did n’t you tell me so before? ” 

209 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ I can’t see what it has to do with things.” 

“ It has everything,” he answered. “ It makes 
me see how wrong I have been, how rude'. It 
makes me want to apologize for everything I have 
said since I came into the kitchen. It makes me 
ask you most humbly if you won’t help me out in 
the ridiculous situation in which I find myself.” 

“ But I don’t see why Smithfield’s being — ” 

“ It would take a long time to explain,” an- 
swered Burton, “ although, I assure you, it can and 
shall be done. Perhaps this evening, after these 
tiresome men have gone, you will give me a few 
minutes. In the meantime, just let me say that I 
was angry at you, however wrongly, when I came 
down — ” 

“ I ’m not sure but that I ’m still angry at yoM,” 
said the cook, but she smiled as she said it. 

“You have every right to be, and no reason,” 
he returned. “ And you are going to be an angel 
and serve dinner, are n’t you ? ” 

“ I said I would if asked politely.” 

“ Though how in the world I shall sit still and 
let you wait on me, I don’t see.” 

“ Oh,” said Jane-Ellen, “ if you never have 


210 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


anything harder to do than that, you are very dif- 
ferent from most of your sex. And now,” she 
added, “ I ’d better run upstairs and put two more 
places at the table, for it ’s dinner-time already.” 

“ If I come back later in the evening, you won’t 
turn me out of the kitchen? ” 

She was already on her way upstairs, but she 
turned with a smile. 

“ It ’s your kitchen, sir,” she said. 

Crane followed her slowly. It occurred to him 
that he must have a talk with Lefferts. He found 
him and Tucker making rather heavy weather of 
conversation in the drawing-room. Tucker had 
naturally enough determined to adopt Mrs. Falk- 
ener’s views of Lefferts. He had conformed with 
Crane’s request and given the poet a cigarette and 
a cocktail, but he had attempted no explanation be- 
yond an unsatisfactory statement that the ladies 
had been called away unexpectedly. 

“ Nothing serious, I hope,” Lefferts had said. 

“ I hope not,” Tucker had returned, and not 
another word would he utter on the subject. 

Lefferts was, therefore, glad to respond to 
Crane’s invitation to come into the office for a few 


2II 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


minutes and leave Tucker to the contemplation of 
his own loyalty. 

Left alone, Tucker’s eager ears soon detected 
the sound of dishes in the dining-room, and he 
knew that this could be produced by the hand of 
no other than Jane-Ellen. The moment seemed 
to have been especially designed for his purpose, 
and he decided to take advantage of it. 

Jane-Ellen was setting the table with far more 
energy than Smithfield had displayed; In fact her 
task was almost finished when Tucker entered, 
and, advancing to the mantelpiece, leaned his el- 
bow on the shelf and smiled down upon her 
benevolently. 

“ The time has come sooner than we anticipated 
when I can be of assistance to you, Jane-Ellen,” 
he said. 

“ Yes, indeed, sir,” she returned with a prompt- 
ness that fifteen years before would have made his 
heart beat faster. 

“ Thank you for giving me the opportunity.” 

“ The finger-bowls, sir,” she interrupted, flick- 
ing a napkin In their direction, “ they ought to be 
filled ; not too full, sir ; that ’s quite enough, it 


212 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


is n’t a tub, you know. And now, if you ’ve a 
match about you, and gentlemen always have 
matches, I believe, would you light the candles, 
and then, yes, I do think we ’re about ready now.” 

Tucker, who could not very well refuse such 
trivial services when he was offering one much 
more momentous, poured a little water from the 
ice pitcher into the glass hnger-bowls, but he did it 
with such dignity and from such a height that he 
spilled much of it over the doilies. The cook did 
not reprove him directly, but she changed the doily 
with a manner that seemed to suggest that another 
time she would do the job herself. And when 
Tucker took a neat gold match-box from his 
pocket and prepared to light the candles, she coolly 
took the whole thing out of his hands, remarking 
that he might set the shades on fire and then 
they ’d be in what she described as “ a nice way.” 

Observing that she was about to leave the room, 
he put himself before the door. 

“ I want just a word, Jane-Ellen.” 

“ No time now, sir. Perhaps to-morrow morn- 
ing.” 

“ To-morrow will be too late. You must know 


213 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


this evening. I don’t want to say a word against 
Mr. Crane; young men who have always had 
everything they want are naturally thoughtless. 
But I can’t bear to see you turned out at a mo- 
ment’s notice — ” 

“ Turned out? ” 

“ Yes, Mr. Crane is going either to-night or 
to-morrow morning. Didn’t he tell you?” 

He had her attention now. She looked at him 
intently. 

“ Mr. Crane going? I thought he had the 
house for six weeks.” 

“ So he had, but he ’s bored with it. Miss 
Falkener has gone, and he sees no reason for stay- 
ing on. He ’ll be off either at midnight or in the 
morning. You ’re about to lose your place, Jane- 
Ellen.” 

She stood staring before her so blankly that it 
grieved him to see her so deeply concerned about 
the loss of her position, and he pressed on. 

“ I can’t bear to think of your comfort being de- 
pendent on the caprices of Crane, or any pne. 
Come to me, Jane-Ellen. This is no life for you) 
with your youth and beauty and charm. I could 
214 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


offer you a position that you need never leave, 
never, unless you wanted to — ” 

“ Please move from the door, sir.” 

“ Not until you Ve heard me,” and he moved 
toward her as if to take her in his arms. 

At some previous period of time, the Revellys, 
presided over by a less elegant functionary than 
Smithfield, must have been in the habit of sum- 
moning the family to meals by means of a large 
Japanese gong that now stood neglected in a cor- 
ner. To this, Jane-Ellen sprang, and beat it with 
a vigor that made the house resound. 

The next instant Crane burst into the room. 
“What’s the matter?” he exclaimed, and 
added, fixing his eyes on his lawyer, 

“ What the deuce are you doing here. Tuck? ” 
“ I,” said Tucker, “ was giving Jane-Ellen what 
help I could in setting the table.” 

“ Like hell you were.” 

“ Do you mean you doubt what I say? ” 

“ You bet I do.” 

“ And may I ask what you do think I was do- 
ing? ” asked Tucker. 

“ I think you were making love to the cook.” 

215 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


“ Gentlemen, gentlemen,” murmured the cook, 
‘‘ won’t you please let me go down and attend to 
the dinner. The chicken will be terribly over- 
done.” 

Nobody paid’ any attention to the request. 

“ Well,” said Tucker, “ I certainly would n’t 
turn a poor girl out at a few hours’ notice, as you' 
mean to do.” 

“ Who says I mean to? ” 

“ You told me yourself you meant to leave to- 
morrow.” 

“ And what kind of a job were you offering 
her?” 

“ I tell you I was trying to help her.” 

“ And is that why she rang the gong? ” 

“ She rang presumably because dinner was 
ready.” 

“ There ’s another presumption that seems to 
me more probable.” 

“ Burton, I shall not spend another night under 
your roof.” 

“ I had reached the same conclusion.” 

Tucker turned with great dignity. 

“ The trouble is,” he said, “ that you have not 
216 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


the faintest idea of the conduct of a gentleman,” 
and with this he walked slowly from the room. 

The cook did not now seem so eager to get back 
to the kitchen. She stood twisting a napkin in her 
hands and looking at the floor, not unaware, how- 
ever, that her employer was looking at her. 

“ The trouble really is, Jane-Ellen,” he said 
gently, “ that you are too intolerably lovely.” 

“ Oh, sir.” 

“ ‘ Oh, sir, oh, sir! ’ You say that as if every 
man you knew had not been saying the same thing 
to you for the last five years.” 

Jane-Ellen had another of her attacks of dan- 
gerous candor. 

“ Well, a good many have said it, sir,” she 
whispered, “ but it never sounded to me as it did 
when you said it.” And after this she had the 
grace to dart through the door and downstairs, so 
fast that he could hear her little heels clatter on 
each step as she went. 

In the hall he found Tucker, standing under a 
lamp, studying a time-table, with glasses set very 
far down his nose. Opposite, Lefferts was lean- 
ing against the wall, his arms folded and the ex- 
2I7j 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


pression on his face of one who has happened un- 
expectedly upon a very good moving picture show. 

Seeing Crane, Tucker folded up his time-table 
and removed his glasses. 

“ Your other guest has just arrived,” he ob- 
served. 

“ Oh, is Reed here? ” 

“ Yes,” said Lefferts, “ he ’s in your office tak- 
ing off his coat.” 

“ And you may be interested to know,” added 
Tucker, with a biting simplicity that had impressed 
many juries in its time, “ you may be interested 
to know that he is the man I found kissing Jane- 
Ellen last week.” 

” What, Reed ! ” cried Crane, with a gesture 
that might have been interpreted as ferocious. 

Hearing his name called, Reed came hurrying 
out. 

“ Yes,” he said, advancing with outstretched 
hand, ” here I am. Sorry to be late, but I was 
ready before — ” 

“ We ’ll go in to dinner,” said Crane shortly. 
Tucker and Reed moved first toward the dining- 
room. Lefferts drew his host aside. 

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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ Just one moment,” he said. “ You went off 
so quickly when that gong rang that I did not have 
any chance to tell you how I feel about your gen- 
erosity. It makes — ” 

Crane grasped his hand. 

“ You have an opportunity this very moment,” 
he replied, “ to repay me for anything I ever have 
done or may do for you. Talk, my dear fellow, 
talk at dinner. Do nothing but talk. Otherwise, 
I shall knock those two men’s heads together.” 

Lefferts smiled. 

“ I doubt if you ’d get much sense into them 
even if you did,” he murmured. 

“ No,” answered Burton, “ but I should have a 
great deal of enjoyment in doing it.” 


219 


XI 


T hey sat down at table, and, as Crane looked 
at his guests, he had little hope that even 
Lefferts’ cheerful facility could save the situation. 
Circumstances would be too much against him. 
Even the poet himself could hardly be at his best, 
having just arrived in the hope of dining with his 
lady-love to find she had been spirited away by an 
irate mother. This in itself was enough to put a 
pall on most men; yet, of the three guests, Lef- 
ferts seemed by far the most hopeful. Tucker 
was already sullen and getting more sullen every 
moment. Crane knew the signs of his lawyer’s 
bearing — the irritable eye that would meet no 
one’s directly, the tapping fingers, the lips com- 
pressed but moving. Tucker was one of those 
people cursed by anger after the event. His na- 
ture, slow moving or overcontrolled, bore him 
past the real moment of offense without explo- 
sion; but with the crisis over, his resentment be- 
gan to gain in strength and to grow more bitter 


220 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


as the opportunity for action receded more and 
more into the past. Crane knew now that Tucker 
was reviewing every phrase that had passed be- 
tween them; every injury, real or fancied, that he 
had ever received at Crane’s hands; these he was 
summoning like a sort of phantom army to fight 
on his side. No, Tucker was not a guest from 
whom any host could expect much genial inter- 
change that evening. 

Reed, on the other hand, was too unconscious. 
Placid, good-natured, confident in his own powers 
to arrange any little domestic difficulties that 
might have arisen, he sat down, unfolded his nap- 
kin, and turned to Lefferts in answer to the inquiry 
about real estate which Lefferts h-ad just tactfully 
addressed to him. 

“ The great charm of this section of the coun- 
try,” he was saying, “ is that from the time of Its 
earliest settlement it has been in the hands of a 
small group of — ” At this instant Jane-Ellen en- 
tered with the soup. Reed, who had expected to 
see Smithfield, stopped short, and stared at her 
with an astonishment he did not even attempt to 
disguise. Lefferts, following the direction of his 


221 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


eyes and seeing Jane-Ellen for the first time, mis- 
took the subject of Reed’s surprise. 

“ Oh,” he said, as the girl left the room, “ is 
this ‘ the face that launched a thousand ships ’ ? ” 

Tucker, who was perhaps not as familiar with 
the Elizabethan dramatists as he should have 
been, replied shortly that this was the cook. 

“ A very beautiful little person,” said Lefferts, 
imagining, poor fellow, that he was now on safe 
ground. 

“ I own,” said Tucker, “ that I have never been 
able to take much interest in the personal appear- 
ance of servants.” 

“ You sometimes behave as if you did. Tuck.” 
remarked his host. 

“ If you are interested in beauty,” observed 
Lefferts, “ I don’t see how you can eliminate any 
of its manifestations, particularly according to 
social classes.” 

“ Such a preoccupation with beauty strikes me as 
decadent,” answered Tucker crossly. 

“ Indeed, how delightful,” Lefferts replied. 
“ What, exactly, is your definition of ‘ deca- 
dent’?”. 


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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

Now in Tucker’s vocabulary the word “ deca- 
dent ” was a hate word. It signified nothing defi- 
nite, except that he disliked the person to whose 
opinions he applied it. He had several others of 
the same sort — hysterical, half-baked and sub- 
versive-of-the-Constitution being those most often 
in use. This being so, he really could n’t define 
the word, and so he pretended not to hear and 
occupied himself flicking an imaginary crumb from 
the satin lapel of his coat. 

Lefferts, who had no wish to be disagreeable, 
did not repeat the question, but contented himself 
by observing that he had never tasted such de- 
licious soup. Reed shook his head in an ecstasy 
that seemed to transcend words. Only Tucker 
scowled. 

As Jane-Ellen entered at this moment to take 
away the soup-plates. Crane, who was growing 
reckless, decided to let her share the compliment. 

“ The gentlemen enjoyed the soup, Jane-Ellen,” 
he said, “ at least, Mr. Lefferts and Mr. Reed did, 
but Mr. Tucker has not committed himself. Did 
you enjoy the soup. Tuck? ” 

Tucker rapped with his middle finger. 

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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


“ I care very little for my food,” he answered. 

“ Well,” said Crane, “ I Ve heard of hating 
the sin and loving the sinner; I suppose it Is pos- 
sible to hate the cooking and — and — ” He 
paused. 

“ I did not say I hated the cooking,” answered 
Tucker. “ I only say I am not Interested In talk- 
ing about It all the time.” 

“ All right,” said Burton, “ we ’ll talk about 
something else, and you shall have first choice of 
a topic. Tuck.” 

“ One moment before we begin,” exclaimed 
Reed, “ I must ask, where is Smithfield? ” 

Crane turned to him. 

“ Smithfield,” he said, “ In common with my 
two guests, the housemaid Lily and the boy Brln- 
dlebury, have all left, or been ejected from my 
house within the last twenty-four hours.” 

“ You mean,” gasped Reed, “ that you and Mr. 
Tucker and the cook are alone in the house ! ” 

“ I regret to say that Mr. Tucker also leaves 
me this evening.” 

“But — but — ” began Reed, in a protest too 
earnest to find words on the instant. 


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“ We won’t discuss the matter now,” said 
Crane. “ I have several things to talk over with 
you, Mr. Reed, after dinner. In the meantime,” 
he added, looking around on the dreary faces of 
all but Lefferts, “ let us enjoy ourselves.” 

“ Certainly, by all means,” agreed Reed, “ but 
I would just like to ask you, Mr. Crane — You 
can’t mean, you don’t intend, you don’t contem- 
plate—” 

“ Oh, I won’t trouble you with my immediate 
plans,” said Crane, and added, turning to Lefferts, 
“ my experience is that no one is really interested 
in any one else’s plans — their daily routine, I 
mean, and small domestic complications.” 

“ Oh, come, I don’t know about that,” answered 
Lefferts, on whom the situation was beginning 
vaguely to dawn. “ Mr. Reed struck me as being 
very genuinely interested in your intentions. 
You are genuinely interested, are n’t you, Mr. 
Reed?” 

Reed was interested beyond the point of being 
able to suspect malice. 

“ Yes, yes,” he said eagerly, “ I am, genuinely, 
sincerely. You see, I understand what would be 
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said in a community like this, — what would be 
thought. You get my idea? ” 

“ I own I don’t,” answered Burton suavely, 
“ but I will say this much, that In deciding my con- 
duct, I have usually considered my own opinion 
rather than that of others.” 

“ Of course, exactly. I do, myself,” said Reed, 
“ but in this case, I really think you would agree 
with me If I could make myself clear.” 

“ Doubtless, doubtless,” answered Crane, and 
seeing that Jane-Ellen was again in the room, he 
went on: “What is It exactly that we are talk- 
ing about? What is It that you fear? ” 

Reed cast an agonized look at the cook and re- 
mained speechless, but Tucker, with more expe- 
rience in the befogging properties of language, 
rushed to his assistance. 

“ It ’s perfectly clear what he means,” he said. 
“ Mr. Reed’s idea is that In a small community like 
this the conduct of every individual Is watched, 
scrutinized and discussed, however humble a 
sphere he or she may occupy; and that if any 
young woman should find herself in a position 
which has been considered a compromising one by 
226 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 

every author and dramatist in the language, she 
would not be saved from the inevitable criticism 
that would follow by the mere fact that — ” 

But here something very unfortunate happened. 
The lip of the ice-water pitcher, which Jane-Ellen 
was approaching to Tucker’s glass, suddenly 
touched his shoulder, and a small quantity of the 
chilling liquid trickled between his collar and his 
neck. It was not enough to be called a stream, 
and yet it was distinctly more than a drop ; it was 
sufficient to cut short his sentence. 

“ Oh, sir, I ’m so sorry,” she cried, and she 
added, with a sort of wail, looking at Crane, 
“ You see how it is, sir, I ’m not used to waiting on 
table.” 

“ I think she waits admirably,” murmured Lef- 
ferts aside to his host. 

“ Extremely competent, I call it,” said Crane 
clearly. “ Don’t give it another thought, Jane- 
Ellen. See,” he added, glancing at Tucker’s face 
which was distorted with anger, “ Mr. Tucker 
has forgotten it already.” 

“ Oh, sir, how kind you are to me ! ” cried the 
cook and ran hastily into the pantry, from which a 
227 


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sound which might have been a cough was instantly 
heard. 

“ Yours is a strange but delightful home, 
Crane,” observed Lefferts. “ I don’t really re- 
call ever having experienced anything quite like 
it.” 

“ You refer, I fancy,” replied Crane, “ to the 
simple peace, the assured confidence that — ” 

“ That something unexpected is going to hap- 
pen within the next ten seconds.” 

Tucker and Reed, both absorbed in their pri- 
vate wrongs, were for an instant like deaf men, 
but the latter having now dried his neck and as 
much of his collar as was possible, showed signs 
of coming to, so that Crane included both in the 
conversation. 

“ Lefferts and I were speaking,” he said, slightly 
raising his voice, “ of the peculiar atmosphere 
that makes for the enjoyment of a home. What, 
Mr. Reed, do you think is most essential? ” 

“ Just one moment, Mr. Crane,” said Reed. 
“ I want to say a word more of that other subject 
we were speaking of.” 

Crane’s seat allowed him to see the pantry door 
228 


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before any one else could. On it his eyes were 
fixed as he answered thoughtfully : 

“ Our last subject. Now, let me see, wh'at was 
that? ” 

“ It was the question of the propriety of — ” 

“ Fish, sir? ” said a gentle voice in Reed’s ear. 
He groaned and helped himself largely and in si- 
lence. 

Lefferts, who was really kind-hearted, pitied 
his distress and decided to change the topic. 

“ What a fine old house this is,” he said, glanc- 
ing around the high-ceilinged room. “ Who does 
it belong to? ” 

“ It belongs,” answered Tucker, “ to a family 
named Revelly — a family who held a highly hon- 
ored position in the history of our country until 
they took the wrong side in war.” 

“ In this part of the country, sir,” cried Reed, 
“ we are not accustomed to thinking it the wrong 
side.” 

Tucker bowed slightly. 

“ I believe that I am voicing the verdict of his- 
tory and time,” he answered. 

It was in remorse, perhaps, for having stirred 
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up this new subject of dispute that Lefferts now 
went on rapidly, too rapidly to feel his way. 

“ Well, this present generation seems to be an 
amusing lot. Eliot was telling me about them last 
night. He says one of the girls is a perfect 
beauty. Now, what was her name — such a 
pretty one. Oh, yes,” he added, slightly raising 
his voice, as his memory gave it to him, 
“ Claudia.” 

“What?” said the cook. 

“ Nobody spoke to you, Jane-Ellen,” said 
Crane, but his eyes remained fixed on her long and 
meditatively as she handed the sauce for the fish. 

Lefferts continued : 

“ Eliot said that she was a most indiscrimina- 
ting fascinator — engaged to three men last sum- 
mer, to his knowledge. Our Northern girls are 
infants compared — ” 

Reed suddenly sprang up from the table. 

“ I ’d be obliged, sir,” he said, “ if you ’d tell 
Mr. Eliot, with my compliments, that that story 
of his is untrue, and if he does n’t know it, he 
ought to. I don’t blame you, sir, a stranger, for 
repeating all you hear about one of the loveliest 
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young ladies in the country, but I do blame 
him—” 

At this the cook approached him and said with 
a stern civility: 

“ Do sit down and eat your fish, sir, before it 
gets cold.” They exchanged a long and bitter 
glance, but Reed sat down. 

“ I ’m sure you ’ll believe,” said Lefferts, “ that 
I ’m sorry to have said anything I ought not, par- 
ticularly about any friend of yours, Mr. Reed, 
but the truth is, I thought of it only as being 
immensely to the credit of the young lady, in a 
neighborhood which must be, you ’ll forgive my 
saying, rather dull if you ’re not fond of hunt- 
ing.” 

“ The point is not whether it is to her credit or 
not,” returned Reed, who was by no means pla- 
cated, “ the point is that it is not true.” 

“ Probably not,” Lefferts agreed, “ only,” he 
added, after a second’s thought, “ I don’t see how 
any one can say that except the young lady her- 
self.” 

“ Miss Claudia Revelly,” answered Reed, “ is 
one of the most respected and admired young 
231 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


ladies in the State, I may say in the whole South. 
I have known her and her family since she was a 
child, and I should have been informed if any- 
thing of the kind had taken place.” 

As he said this, the glance that the cook cast at 
him was indescribable. It was mingled pity and 
wonder, as much as to say, “ What hope is there, 
after all, for a man who can talk like that? ” 

“ Undoubtedly you ’re right, Mr. Reed,” said 
Lefferts, “ and yet I have never heard of a girl’s 
announcing more than one engagement at a time, 
although it has come within my experience to 
know — ” 

“ But, after all, why not? ” said Crane. “ Per- 
haps that will be the coming fashion. We shall in 
future get letters from our friends, which will be- 
gin: ‘ I want you to know of the three great 
happinesses that have come into my life. I am 
engaged to John Jones, Peter Smith and Paul Rob- 
inson, and I feel almost sure that one of these 
three, early next June — ’ ” 

Seeing that Reed was really growing angry, 
Lefferts hastened to interrupt his host. 

“ I think you might tell us, Mr. Reed,” he said, 
232 



But here something very unfortunate happened 







COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ what the great beauty of the county looks 
like?” 

“ I can’t think that this is the time or place for 
retailing the charms of a young lady as if it were 
a slave market,” answered Reed; and it seemed to 
Crane that the cook, who had come in to change 
the plates, looked a little bit disappointed. 

“ No, not as if it were a slave market,” said 
Lefferts, “ because, of course, it is n’t.” 

“ I can see no reason, Reed,” said Crane, “ why 
you should n’t give us a hint as to whether Miss 
Revelly is blond or brunette, tall or short.” 

“ Perhaps I see reasons that you do not, sir,” 
answered the wretched real estate man. 

“ Well,” said Crane, “ I tell you what, Jane- 
Ellen must have seen her often, — Jane-Ellen,” 
he added, “ you ’ve seen Miss Revelly. What 
does she look like ? ” 

Jane-Ellen advanced into the room thought- 
fully. 

“ Well, sir,” she said, “ it is n’t for me to criti- 
cize my superiors, nor to say a word against a 
young lady whom Mr. Reed admires so much, but 
I have my own reasons, sir, for thinking that there 

235 


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was more in those stories of her engagement than 
perhaps Mr. Reed himself knows. Servants hear 
a good deal, you know, sir, and they do say that 
Miss Revelly — ” 

“ Claudia ! ” burst from Reed. 

“ Miss Claudia Revelly, I should say,” the cook 
corrected herself. “ Well, sir, as for looks — 
let me see — she ’s a tall, commanding looking 
lady—” 

“ With flashing black eyes? ” asked Crane. 

“ And masses of blue-black hair.” 

“A noble brow?” 

“ A mouth too large for perfect beauty.” 

“ A queenly bearing? ” 

“ An irresistible dignity of manner.” 

“ Jane-Ellen,” said Crane, “ I feel almost as if 
Miss Claudia Revelly were standing before me.” 

“ Oh, indeed, sir, if it were she, it ’s you who 
would be standing,” said the cook. 

“ For my part,” said Crane, turning again to the 
table, “ I had imagined her to myself as quite dif- 
ferent. I had supposed her small, soft-eyed, with 
tiny hands and feet and a mouth — ” He was 
looking at Jane-Ellen’s mouth, as if that might 
236 


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give him an inspiration, when Reed interrupted. 

“ I regret to say, Mr. Crane,” he said, “ that 
if this conversation continues to deal disrespect- 
fully with the appearance of a young lady for 
whom — ” 

“Disrespectfully!” cried Crane. “I assure 
you, I had no such intention. I leave it to you, 
Jane-Ellen, whether anything disrespectful was 
said about this young lady.” 

“ It did not seem so to me, sir,” answered the 
cook, with all her gentlest manner. “ But,” she 
added, glancing humbly at Reed, “of course, it 
would never do for a servant like me to be setting 
up my opinion on such a matter against a gentle- 
man like Mr. Reed.” 

“ What I mean is, if Miss Revelly were here, 
do you think she would object to anything we have 
said?” 

“ Indeed, I ’m sure she would actually have en- 
joyed it, sir.” 

“ Well, then, she ought not,” shouted Reed 
sternly. 

Jane-Ellen shook her head sadly. 

“ Ah, sir,” she said, “ young ladies like Miss 

237 


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Revelly don’t always do what they ought to, if 
report speaks true.” 

“ May I ask, without impertinence. Burton,” 
said Tucker, at this point, “ whether it is your in- 
tention to give us nothing whatsoever to drink 
with our dinner? ” 

“ No, certainly not,” cried Crane. “ Jane- 
Ellen, why have n’t you served the champagne ? ” 

The reason for this omission was presently only 
too clear. Jane-Ellen had not the faintest idea 
of how to open the bottle. Crane, listening with 
one ear to his guests, watched her wrestling with 
it in a corner, holding it as if it were a venomous 
reptile. 

“ For my part,” Tucker was saying, “ I have a 
great deal of sympathy with the stand Mr. Reed 
has taken. Any discussion of a woman behind 
her back runs at least the risk — ” 

Suddenly Crane shouted : 

“ Look out ! Don’t do that ! ” He was speak- 
ing not to Tucker, but to the cook. His warning, 
however, came too late. There was the sound of 
breaking glass and a deep cherry-colored stain 
dyed the napkin in Jane-Ellen’s hand. 

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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


All four chairs were pushed back, all four men 
sprang to her side. 

“ Let me see your hand.” 

“ Is it badly cut?” 

“ An artery runs near there.” 

“ Is there any glass in it? ” 

They crowded around her, nor did any one of 
them seem to be averse to taking the case entirely 
into his own control. 

“ There are antiseptics and bandages upstairs,” 
said Crane. 

“ Better let me wash it well at the tap in the 
pantry,” urged Reed. 

“ Does it hurt horribly? ” asked Lefferts. 

Tucker, putting on his glasses, observed : 

“ I have had some experience in surgery, and if 
you will let me examine the wound by a good 
light — ” 

“ Oh, gentlemen,” said Jane-Ellen, “ this Is ab- 
surd. It ’s nothing but a scratch. Do sit down 
and finish your dinner, and let me get through my 
work.” 

As the injury did not, after a closer observation, 
seem to be serious, the four men obeyed. But 

239 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


they did so In silence; not even Lefferts and Crane 
could banter any more. Tucker had never made 
any pretense of recovering his temper, and Reed 
seemed to be revolving thoughts of deep import. 

As they rose from table, Crane touched the arm 
of Reed. 

“ Come into the office, will you? I have some- 
thing I want to say to you.” 

“ And I to you,” said Reed, with feeling. 


240 


XII 


O NCE in the little office, Crane did not Imme- 
diately speak. He drew up two chairs, put 
a log on the fire, turned up the lamp, and in short 
made it evident that he intended to do that cruel 
deed sometimes perpetrated by parents, guardians 
and schoolmasters in Interviews of this sort — he 
was going to leave it to the culprit to make a be- 
ginning. 

Reed, fidgeting in a nearby chair, did not at 
once yield to this compulsion, but finally the calm 
with which Crane was balancing a pen on a pencil 
broke down his resolution and he said crossly : 

“ I understood you had something to say to me, 
Mr. Crane.” 

Crane threw aside pencil and pen. “ I thought 
it might be the other way,” he answered. “ But, 
yes, if you like. I have something to say to you. 
I have decided to break my lease and leave this 
house to-morrow.” 


241 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

“ You don’t mean to go without paying the sec- 
ond instalment of the rent? ” 

“Why not? The Revellys have broken, or 
rather have never fulfilled their part of the con- 
tract. I took the house on the written under- 
standing that servants were to be supplied, and 
you are my witness, Mr. Reed, that to-night I 
have no one left but a cook.” 

“ Oh, come, Mr. Crane ! We only agreed to 
provide the servants. We could not guarantee 
that you would not dismiss them. You must own 
they showed no inclination to leave the house.” 

“ No, I ’ll not deny that,” returned Burton 
grimly. 

“ No sane man,” continued Reed eagerly, 
“ would allow the payment of his rent to depend 
on whether or not you chose to keep a staff of 
servants in many ways above the average. You ’ll 
not deny, I think, sir, that the cooking has been 
above the average? ” 

Crane had reached a state of mind in which it 
was impossible for him to discuss even the cul- 
inary powers of Jane-Ellen, particularly with 
Reed, and so he slightly shifted the ground. 

242 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 

“ Let us,” he said, “ run over the reasons for 
which I dismissed them: The housemaid, for 
calling one of my guests an old harridan ; the boy, 
for habitually smoking my cigarettes, for attempt- 
ing to strike Mr. Tucker, and finally, for stealing 
a valuable miniature belonging to the house; the 
butler, for again introducing this same larcenous 
boy into the house disguised as a lame old man. 
The question is not whether I should have kept 
them, but whether I should not stay on here and 
have them all arrested.” 

Reed’s face changed. “ Oh 1 I hope you won’t 
do that, Mr. Crane,” he said. 

Burton saw his advantage. “ I should not 
care,” he answered, “ to go through life feeling I 
had been responsible for turning a dangerous gang 
loose upon the countryside.” 

“ They are not that, sir. I pledge my word 
they are not that.” 

“ There is a good deal of evidence against that 
pledge.” 

“ You doubt my word, sir? ” 

“ I feel there is much more to be explained than 
you seem willing to admit. For instance, how 

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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


comes it that you are a — I will not say welcome 
— but at least assured visitor in my kitchen ? ” 

Reed felt himself coloring. “ I do not feel 
called upon,” he replied, “ to explain my conduct 
to any one.” 

“ In that case,” said Crane, getting to his feet,. 
“ this interview might as well end. I shall leave 
to-morrow, and if you and your friends, the Rev- 
ellys, feel yourselves aggrieved, we can only take 
the matter into court. If the record of these 
servants is as excellent as you seem to think, they 
can have nothing to fear. If it is n’t, the whole 
matter will be cleared up.” 

This was the crisis of the conversation, for 
as Crane moved to the door, Reed stopped 
him. 

“ Wait a moment, Mr. Crane,” he said. 
” There are circumstances in this connection that 
you do not know.” 

“ Yes, I guessed that much.” 

“If you will sit down, I should like to tell you 
the whole story.” 

Crane yielded and sat down, without giving 
Reed the satisfaction of knowing that his nervous- 
244 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


ness at the expected revelation was as extreme as 
Reed’s. 

“ The Revellys, Mr. Crane, are among the 
most respected of our Southern gentry. They 
fought for the original liberties of this country, 
and in the war of secession — ” 

Crane nodded. “ I know my history, Mr. 
Reed.” 

“ But, sir, their distinguished position and high 
abilities have not saved them from financial re- 
verses. The grandfather lost everything in the 
war; and the present owner, Henry Patrick Rev- 
elly, has not been completely successful. Last 
winter a breakdown in his health compelled him to 
leave the country at short notice. His four chil- 
dren — ” 

“ Four children, Mr. Reed? Two girls and 
two boys? ” 

“ Four grown children, Mr. Crane. The eld- 
est is twenty-six, the youngest seventeen. They 
were left with a roof over their heads and a sum 
of money — a small sum — to provide for them 
during the absence of their parents. Not a satis- 
factory arrangement, sir, but made in haste and 

245 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


distress. Mrs. Revelly’s devotion to her husband 
is such that in her alarm for him, she did not per- 
haps sufficiently consider her children. At the 
moment when, left alone, their difficulties began to 
press upon them, your offer, your generous offer, 
for the house was made. There was no time to 
submit it to their parents, nor, to be candid with 
you, would there have been the slightest chance 
of Mr. Revelly’s accepting it. He has never been 
able to tolerate the mere suggestion of renting 
Revelly Hall. But the four young people felt 
differently. It was natural, it was in my opinion 
commendable, that they decided to move out of 
their home for the sake of realizing a large sum 
— the largest sum probably that had come into 
the family purse for many years. But an obstacle 
soon appeared. You had insisted that servants 
should be provided. This was impossible. 
They tried earnestly. Miss Claudia told me her- 
self that she went everywhere within a radius of 
twenty miles, except to the jails. At last it be- 
came a question of refusing your offer, or of — 
of — I believe you have already guessed the alter- 
native.” 


246 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ This is not a time for the exercise of my cre- 
ative faculties, Mr! Reed. What was their de- 
cision? ” 

Reed’s discomfort increased. “ I wish you 
could have been present as I was, Mr. Crane, on 
that occasion. We were sitting round the fire in 
the sitting-room, depressed that Miss Claudia’s 
mission had not succeeded, when suddenly she 
said, with a determination quite at variance with 
her gentle appearance, ‘ Well, I ’ve found a cook 
for him — and a mighty good one, too.’ 
‘ Where did you find her? ’ I asked in astonish- 
ment, for only a moment before she had been con- 
fessing absolute failure. ‘ I found her,’ she an- 
swered, ‘ where charity begins.’ I own that even 
then I did not get the idea, but her brother Paul, 
who always understands her, saw at once what was 
in her mind. ‘ Yes,’ she went on, ‘ I ’ve found 
an excellent cook, a good butler, a rather inef- 
ficient housemaid, and a dangerous extra boy,’ and 
she looked from one to the other of her family as 
she spoke. Her meaning was clear. They them- 
selves were to take the places of the servants they 
could not find. As Paul pointed out, the plan had 
247 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


the advantage of saving them the trouble of find- 
ing board and lodgings elsewhere. Miss Lily 
was opposed from the start. Her nature, exceed- 
ingly refined and retiring, revolted, but no one in 
the Revelly family can bear up against the com- 
bined wills of Paul and Miss Claudia. How the 
plan was carried out you know.” 

There was a short silence. It was now some 
days since Crane had suspected the identity of his 
servants, an hour since Jane-Ellen had turned at 
the name of Claudia and made him sure. Nev- 
ertheless the certainty that Reed’s confession 
brought was very grateful to him; so grateful that 
he feared his expression would betray him, and he 
assumed a look of stern blankness. 

Seeing this, Reed thought it necessary to plead 
the culprits’ cause. 

“ After all, Mr. Crane, was there not courage 
and self-sacrifice needed? You see this explains 
everything. The miniature of their grandmother 
was taken upstairs for fear its likeness to Miss 
Claudia might betray them. Miss Lily, who as I 
said never approved of the plan, was constitution- 
ally unable to be calm under the accusation of 
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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


stealing a hat, made, as I understand, rather 
roughly by Mrs. Falkener. I should be very 
sorry if your opinion of the Revelly family — ” 

“ I can’t see what my opinion has to do with 
the situation,” said Crane. Every moment now 
that kept him from Claudia was to him an intol- 
erable bore. He drew his check-book toward 
him. “ However, your story has convinced me 
of this — my only course is to pay my rent in 
full.” 

Reed began to feel the pride of the successful 
diplomat. “ And one other thing, Mr. Crane. 
You see the necessity of not mentioning this. It 
would make a great deal of talk in the country. A 
young lady’s name — ” 

Burton rose quickly. It was not agreeable to 
him to have Reed pleading with him for the 
preservation of Claudia’s reputation. 

“ Here ’s your check,” he said. 

Reed pressed on. “ And another thing will 
now be equally clear to you, I am sure. Miss 
Revelly cannot possibly spend the night here 
alone.” 

“ That,” replied Crane, “ is a question for Miss 
249 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


Revelly herself to decide. My motors are at her 
disposal to take her anywhere she may choose to 
go.” And he opened the door as if he expected 
that Reed would now take his departure. 

But Reed did not move. “ I cannot go away 
and leave Miss Revelly here alone with you,” he 
said. 

” Of the two alternatives,” said Crane, “ you 
might find it more diflUcult to stay In my house 
without my consent. But I ’ll leave it this way — 
do you think Miss Revelly would regard your 
presence as a protection ? ” 

“ I don’t understand you, sir.” 

“ Your last visit to my kitchen did not, I be- 
lieve, inspire her with confidence. Shall we leave 
the decision to her? ” 

Reed went out In silence. He had had no rec- 
onciliation with Jane-EIlen since that fatal kiss in 
the kitchen, and he knew she would not now side 
with him. He decided to go away and find her 
brothers. 

Lefferts, meanwhile, left alone, had stretched 
himself on a sofa, and was smoking, with his eyes 
fixed on the ceiling. 


250 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ My dear fellow,” cried Crane with some com- 
punction, “ were you waiting to see me? ” 

“ I was waiting for my motor,” answered the 
poet. “ You know that, imagining this to be an 
ordinary dinner-party, I ordered it back at a quar- 
ter before eleven.” 

“ Where ’s Tucker? ” asked Burton. 

At this moment a step was heard on the stairs 
and Tucker, dressed in a neat gray suit, adapted 
to traveling, wearing a cap and goggles and 
carrying his bag, descended the stairs. 

On seeing his host he approached and held out 
his hand. “ Good-by, Burton,” he said, “ I hope 
the time will come when you will forgive me for 
having tried too hard to serve you. For myself, I 
entirely forgive your hasty rudeness. I hope we 
part friends.” 

Crane hesitated, and then shook hands with 
his lawyer. “ There ’s no use in pretending. 
Tucker,” he said, “ that I feel exactly friendly to 
you, and, if you ’ll forgive my saying so, I can’t 
believe that you feel so to me. You and I have 
got on each other’s nerves lately; and that’s the 
truth. How much that means, only time can 
251 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


show. Sometimes it is very important, sometimes 
very trivial; but while such a state exists, I agree 
with you that two people are better apart. Good- 
by.” 

Here, Jane-Ellen, who had just finished put- 
ting the dining-room in order, came out into 
the hall followed by Willoughby. As she saw 
Tucker, she had one of her evil inspirations. 

Springing forward, she exclaimed: “Oh, 
was n’t it a pity, sir, you had to do your own pack- 
ing! Let me put your bag in the motor for 
you.” 

Tucker was again caught by one of his mo- 
ments of indecision. He did not want Jane-Ellen 
to carry his luggage, but he did not consider it dig- 
nified to wrestle with her for the possession of it, 
so that in the twinkling of an eye she had seized it 
and carried it down the steps. 

But he was not utterly without resource. He 
had been holding a two-dollar bill in his hand, 
more from recollections of other visits than be- 
cause he now expected to find any one left to fee. 
This, as Jane-Ellen came up the steps, he thrust 
into her hand, saying clearly: 

252 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ Thank you, my girl, there ’s for your 
trouble.” 

Jane-Ellen just glanced at it, and then crum- 
pling it into a ball she threw it across the hall. 
Willoughby, who like many other sheltered crea- 
tures retained his playfulness late in life, bounded 
after it, caught it up in his paws, threw it about, 
and finally set on it with his sharp little teeth and 
bit it to pieces. But neither Tucker nor the cook 
waited to see the end. He got into the car and 
rolled away, and she went back to the kitchen. 

Crane glanced at Lefferts, to whom plainly his 
duty as host pointed, and then he hurried down 
the kitchen stairs, closing the door carefully be- 
hind him. 


253 


XIII 


J ANE-ELLEN was shaking out her last dish- 
cloth, her head turned well over her shoulder 
to avoid the shower of spray that came from 
it. He seated himself on the kitchen-table, and 
watched her for some time in silence. 

“ And is that the way you treat all presents, 
Jane-Ellen,” he asked, “ throwing them to Wil- 
loughby to tear to pieces ? ” 

“ That was not a present, sir. Presents arc 
between equals, I Ve always thought.” 

“ Then, Jane-Ellen, I don’t see how you can 
ever hope to get any.” 

She looked at him and smiled. “ Your talk is 
too deep and clever for a poor girl like me to un- 
derstand, sir.” 

He smiled back. “ They ’ve all gone, Jane- 
Ellen,” he said. 

The news did not seem to disturb the cook 
in the least. Reed would have been shocked 

254 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 


by the calmness with which she received it. 

“ And now you ’re all alone, sir,” she replied. 

“ Absolutely alone.” 

She was still pattering about the kitchen, put- 
ting the last things to rights, but — or so it seemed 
to Crane — a little busier than her occupation 
warranted. 

“They left early, sir, didn’t they? But then 
it did not seem to me that they were really enjoy- 
ing themselves, not even Mr. Lefferts, though he 
is such an amusing genteman. Every one seemed 
sad, sir, except you.” 

“ I was sad, too, Jane-Ellen.” 

“Indeed, sir?” 

“ Something was said at dinner that distressed 
me deeply.” 

“ By whom, sir? ” 

“By you.” 

She did not stop her work nor seem very much 
surprised, but of course she asked what her unfor- 
tunate speech had been. 

“ I was sorry to hear you say you believed in 
Miss Revelly’s triple engagement.” 

At this she did stop short, and immediately in 

255 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


his vicinity. “ But I did not know you knew Miss 
Revelly.” 

“ Yet I do.” 

“ And when I was describing her — ” 

“ It was as if I saw her before me.” 

“ I am sorry I said anything about a friend 
of yours, sir. I had supposed she was quite a 
stranger to you.” 

“ Sometimes it seems to me, too, as if she were 
a stranger,” Crane answered. “ Each time I see 
her, Jane-Ell en, she seems to me so lovely and 
wonderful and miraculous that it is as if I saw her 
for the first time. Sometimes when I am away 
from her it seems to me quite ridiculous to believe 
that such a creature exists in this rather tiresome 
old world, and I feel like rushing back from wher- 
ever I am to assure myself that she isn’t just a 
creation of my own passionate desire. In this 
sense, I think she will always be a stranger, al- 
ways be a surprise to me even if I should have 
the great felicity of spending the rest of my days 
with her. Does it bore you, Jane-Ellen, to hear 
me talking this way about my own feelings ? ” 

Jane-Ellen did not answer; indeed something 
256 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


seemed to suggest that she could not speak, but she 
shook her head and Burton went on. 

“ So you see why it distressed me to hear from 
so good an authority as yourself that she had al- 
ready engaged herself three times. It is not that 
I am of a jealous nature, Jane-Ellen, but when 
I ask her to be my wife, if she should say yes, 
I should want to feel sure that that meant — ” 
“Oh, Mr. Crane!” said Jane-Ellen, “I said 
that to make Mr. Reed angry.” 

“ And there was no truth in it? ” 

There was a pause. Jane-Ellen looked down 
and wriggled her shoulders a little. 

“ Well,” she admitted, “ there was some truth 
in it. They were not exactly engagements. We 
think in this part of the world that there ’s some- 
thing almost too harsh in a flat no — oh ! the truth 
is,” she added, suddenly changing her tone, “ that 
girls don’t know what they ’re doing until they find 
that they have fallen in love themselves.” 

“ And do you think by any chance that this reve- 
lation may have come to Miss Revelly? ” 

“ I know right well it has,” answered Jane- 
Ellen. 


257 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ Oh, my dear love I ” cried Crane and took her 
into his arms. 

The kitchen clock, loudly ticking, looked down 
upon them on one side, and Willoughby, loudly 
purring, looked up at them from the other, and a 
good deal of ticking and purring was done before 
Claudia broke the silence by saying, like one to 
whom a good idea has come rather late : 

“ But I never said it was through you that the 
revelation came.” 

“ You must n’t say that it has n’t even in fun — 
not yet.” 

“ When may I?” 

“ When we ’ve been married five years.” 

Sometime later, when, that is to say, they had 
talked a little longer in the kitchen, and then shut 
it up for the night, and had gone and sat a little 
while in the parlor so that he might realize that 
she really was Miss Claudia Revelly, and they 
had sat a little while in the office so that she might 
act out for him the impression he had made on her 
during that first famous interview when he had 
reproved her conduct, when all these important 
conversations had taken place. Crane at last took 
258 



** And there was no truth in it ? ” 

















COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


her hand and said gravely : “ I must n’t keep you 

up any longer. Good night, my darling.” And 
he added, after an instant, “ I ’m so glad — so 
grateful — that your mind does n’t work like 
Reed’s and Tucker’s.” 

“ Like theirs — in what way? ” 

“ I ’m glad you have n’t thought it necessary to 
make any protest at our being here alone.” 

A slight motion of his beloved’s shoulders told 
him she was not fully at one with him. 

“ How foolish. Burton, of course I trust you 
absolutely, only — ” 

“ Only what—” 

She evidently felt that it was a moment when 
something decisive must be done, for she came and 
laid her head, not on his shoulder, but as near as 
she could reach, which was about in the turn of his 
elbow. 

His arm was coldly limp. “ Only what? ” he 
repeated. 

“ Only we ’re not really alone.” 

“ What do you mean, Claudia? ” 

“ They ’re all here — my brothers and sis- 
ter.” 


261 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ What, Smithfield, and Lily, and even Brindle- 
bury?” 

She nodded in as much space as she had. 

“ Where are they? ” he asked. 

“ They ’re playing Coon-Can in the garret. 
And oh,” she added with a sudden spasm of recol- 
lection, “they’ll be so hungry! They haven’t 
had anything to eat for ages. I promised to bring 
them something as soon as the house was quiet, 
only you put everything out of my head.” 

“We ’ll give them a party in the dining-room 
— our first,” said Crane. “ I ’ll write the invi- 
tation, and we ’ll send Lefferts to the garret with 
it.” 

“ Don’t you think I ’d better go up and ex- 
plain?” said Claudia. 

“ The invitation will explain,” answered Bur- 
ton. It read: “Mr. Burton Crane and Miss 
Claudia Revelly request the pleasure of the Rev- 
ellys’ company at supper immediately.” 

They roused Lefferts, who had by this time 
fallen into a comfortable sleep. “ Just run up 
and give this note to the people you ’ll find in the 
garret, there ’s a good fellow,” said Crane. 

262 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


Lefferts sat up, rubbing his eyes. “ The peo- 
ple I ’ll find in the garret,” he murmured. “ But 
how about the little black men in the chimney, 
and the ghosts who live in the wall? This is the 
strangest house. Crane, the very strangest house I 
ever knew.” But he took the note and wandered 
slowly upstairs with it, shaking his head. 

On the landing of the second story, his eye 
caught the whisk of a skirt, and pursuing it in- 
stantly, he came upon Lily. He cornered her in 
the angle of the stairs. 

“ Hold on,” he said, “ I have a note for you, 
at least I have if you are one of the people who 
live in the garret.” 

Lily, knowing nothing of the explanation that 
had taken place between Reed and Crane, was not 
a little alarmed at being thus caught in a house 
from which she had been so recently dismissed. 
She did not think quickly in a crisis, and now she 
could find nothing to say but “ I don’t exactly live 
in the garret.” 

“ How interesting it would be,” observed Lef- 
ferts, “ if you would sit down here on the stairs 
and tell me who you are.” 

263 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ There ’s nothing to tell,” said Lily, wonder- 
ing what she had better admit. “ I ’m just the 
housemaid.” 

“ Oh,” cried Lefferts, “ then there are lots of 
things to tell. I have always wanted to ask house- 
maids a number of questions. For instance, why 
is it that you always drop the broom with which 
you sweep the stairs at six in the morning? Why 
do you fancy it will conduce to any one’s comfort 
to shut the blinds and turn on all the lights in a 
bedroom on a hot summer evening? Why do you 
hide the pillows and extra covering so that one 
never finds them until one is packing to go away 
the next morning? If you are a housemaid, you 
do these things; and if you do these things, you 
must know why you do them.” 

Lily smiled. “ I ’m afraid I was a very poor 
housemaid,” she answered. “ Anyhow, I ’m not 
even that any more. I was dismissed.” 

“ Indeed,” said Lefferts. “ Now that must be 
an interesting experience. I have had several per- 
fectly good businesses drop from under me, but I 
have never been dismissed. Might I ask what 
led to it in your case ? ” 

264 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN ! 

A reminiscent smile stole over Lily’s .face. 
“ Mr. Crane dismissed me,” she said, “ for saying 
something which I believe he thought himself. I 
called Mrs. Falkener an old harridan.” 

Lefferts shouted with pleasure. 

“ If Crane had had a spark of intellectual 
honesty, he ’d have raised your wages,” he said. 
“ It ’s just what he wanted to say himself.” 

“Oh! I was glad to be dismissed,” returned 
she. “ I never approved of the whole plan any- 
how.” And then fearing she had betrayed too 
much, she added, “ And now you might tell me 
who you are.” 

“ My name is Lefferts.” 

“ Any relation to the poet? ” 

It would be impossible to deny that this unex- 
pected proof of his fame was agreeable to Lef- 
ferts. The conversation on the stairs became 
more absorbing, and the note was less likely to be 
delivered at all. 

In the meantime Claudia, while setting the 
table in the dining-room, had sent Crane down 
to the kitchen floor to get something out of the 
ice-box. As Crane approached this object about 
265 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN I 


which so many sentimental recollections gathered, 
he saw he had been anticipated. A figure was al- 
ready busy extracting from it a well-filled plate. 
At his step, the figure turned quickly. It was 
Brindlebury. 

Even Brindlebury seemed to appreciate that, 
after all that had occurred in connection with his 
last departure, to be caught once again in Crane’s 
house was a serious matter. It would have been 
easy enough to save himself by a confession that 
he was one of the Revellys, but to tell this with- 
out the consent of his brother and sisters would 
have been considered traitorous in the extreme. 

He backed away from the ice-box. “ Mr. 
Crane,” he said, with unusual seriousness, “ you 
probably feel that an explanation is due you.” 
And there he stopped, not being able at the mo- 
ment to think of anything to say. 

Crane took pity on him. “ Brindlebury,” he 
said, “ it would be ungenerous of me to conceal 
from you that our relative positions are reversed. 
At the present moment the power is all in your 
hands. Have a cigarette. I believe you used to 
like this brand.” 


266 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ Only when I had smoked all my own.” 

“ You see, Brindlebury, it is not only that I am 
obliged to forgive you, I have to go further. I 
have to make up to you. For the truth is, 
Brindlebury, that I want to marry your sister.” 

“ You want to marry Jane-Ellen? ” 

“ More than I can tell you.” 

“And what does she say?” 

“ She likes the idea.” 

“ Bless my soul I you are going to be my 
brother-in-law.” 

“ No rose without its thorn, I understand.” 

The situation was too tempting to the boy’s 
love of a joke. He seated himself on the top of 
the ice-box and folded his arms. 

“ I do not know,” he said, “ that I should be 
justified in giving my consent to any such mar- 
riage. Would it tend to make my sister happy? 
The woman who marries above her social position 
— the man who marries his cook — is bound to 
regret it. Have you considered, Mr. Crane, that 
however you may value my sister yourself, 
many of your proud friends would not receive 
her?” 




267 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


“ To my mind, Brindlebury, these social dis- 
tinctions are very unimportant. Even you I 
should be willing to have to dinner now and then 
when we were alone.” 

“ The deuce you would,” said Brindlebury, and 
added, “ but suppose my sister’s lack of refine- 
ment — ” 

“ I can’t let you talk like that even In fun, Rev- 
elly,” said Crane. “ Get off your ice-box and let 
us go back to Claudia.” 

“ Ah, you knew all along? ” 

“ I have suspected for some time. Reed told 
me this evening.” 

But when they reached the dining-room, 
Claudia was not there. She had gone herself to 
tell her news to her brother Paul. He was sit- 
ting alone In the garret with the remnants of the 
game of Coon-Can before him. Claudia came 
and put her hand on his shoulder, but he did not 
move. 

“ Do you know what I have made up my mind 
to do?” he said. “I mean to go and make a 
clean breast of this to Crane. The game is about 
up, and I don’t think he ’s had a square deal. 

268 



Claudia 





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COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


He ’s a nice fellow, and I ’d like to put myself 
straight with him.” 

Claudia remained standing behind her brother, 
as she asked, “ You like him, Paul? ” 

“ Very much indeed. I think he ’s behaved 
mighty well through all this. Don’t you like 
him?” 

There was an instant’s pause, and then Claudia 
answered simply : 

“ I love him, Paul.” 

Her brother sprang to his feet. “ Don’t say 
that even to yourself, my dear,” he said. “ You 
don’t know what men of his sort are like. Spoilt, 
run after, cold-blooded. He ’s not like the men 
you ’ve ruled over all your life — ” 

“ No, indeed, he ’s not,” said Claudia. 

“ My dear girl,” her brother went on seri- 
ously, “ this is not like you. You must put this out 
of your head. After all, that ought n’t to be very 
hard. You ’ve hardly known the man more than 
a few days.” 

“ Paul, that shows you don’t know what love is. 
It has n’t anything to do with time, or your own 
will. It ’s just there in an instant. People talk 
271 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


as if it were common, as if every one fell in love, 
but I don’t believe they do — not like this. Look 
at me. I ’ve only known this man as you say a 
little while, I ’ve only talked to him a few times, 
and some of those were disagreeable, and yet the 
idea of spending my life with him not only seems 
natural, but all the rest of my life — you and my 
home — seem strange and unfamiliar. I feel 
the way you do when you ’ve been living abroad 
hearing strange languages and suddenly some one 
speaks to you in your own native tongue. When 
Burton — ” 

“ Burton?” 

“ Did n’t I tell you we ’re engaged? ” 

“ My dear Claudia, you must admit we don’t 
really know anything about him.” 

“ You have the rest of your life for finding out, 
Paul.” 

They went downstairs presently to supper — a 
meal that promised to be a good deal more agree- 
able than dinner had been. For all Paul’s ex- 
pressed doubts, he had every disposition to make 
himself pleasant to his future brother-in-law, and 
even Lily had felt his charm. Lefferts, the only 
272 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN! 


person in the dark as to the whole situation, served 
as an excellent audience. All four recounted — 
together and in turn — the whole story, from the 
moment when the idea had first occurred to 
Claudia, at eleven years of age, that she would 
like to learn to cook, down to the subtlest allusion 
of that evening’s dinner-table. 

Then suddenly there was a loud peal at the front 
door-bell. Every one knew instantly what it was 
— Reed returning to make one more effort to save 
Claudia’s reputation. 

“ Well,” said Paul, sinking down in his chair 
and thrusting his hands still deeper into his 
pockets, “ I shan’t let him in. My future depends 
on my getting over the habit of answering bells.” 

“ Same here,” said Brindlebury. 

“ I certainly shan’t open the door for the man,” 
said Crane, “ and Claudia shall go only over my 
dead body.” 

Again the bell rang. 

Lily rose. “ I shall let him in,” she said, “ I 
think you are all very unjust to Randolph.” 

Claudia smiled as her sister left the room. 

“ There,” she said, “ that ’s all right. No one 

273 


COME OUT OF THE KITCHEN 1 


has such a good effect on Randolph as Lily has. 
In fifteen minutes he will be perfectly calm and 
polite. In half an hour she will have persuaded 
him he likes things better the way they are.” 

“ I should think,” said Lefferts, glancing at 
Claudia, “ that it might take her a little longer 
than that.” 

It did take her a little longer. 


THE END 



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